1. Faculty of Environment
  2. School of Earth and Environment
  3. People
  4. Profile

Elisa Greco

  • Position: Research Fellow
  • Areas of expertise: political economy; African studies; critical agrarian studies; critical political ecology
  • Email: E.Greco@leeds.ac.uk

Profile

My main field of expertise is political economy of food and agriculture in Africa. I have a background in African Studies (PhD African Studies, Orientale, Naples), with a specialisation in Development Studies and Political Economy. A Swahili speaker and writer (BA+MA African languages and history), I have ten years of primary research experience in Tanzania and Uganda.

  • Editor, Review of African Political Economy (RoAPE)
  • Founding member, Africa Working Group of the International Initiative for the Promotion of Political Economy (IIPPE)
  • Board member, Leeds University Centre for African Studies (LUCAS)

Research interests

My main research agenda lies within the field of political economy of agrarian change. I couple an ethnographic approach to the study of land and labour questions in East Africa in the neoliberal era with a theoretic analysis of the neoliberal restructuring of agro-food systems on the continent. My past publications focus on the class dynamics of agrarian change, the politics of collective land claims in Tanzania and the restructuring of rice farming in Tanzania and Uganda.

Another research interested I recently developed concerns the relevance and applicability of the labour theory of value and rent in Marxist thought to contemporary environmental and social issues; this involves a broader reflection on agroecology as a political project.

<h4>Research projects</h4> <p>Any research projects I'm currently working on will be listed below. Our list of all <a href="https://environment.leeds.ac.uk/dir/research-projects">research projects</a> allows you to view and search the full list of projects in the faculty.</p>

Qualifications

  • PhD African Studies and Development
  • MA, African Studies
  • BA, African Studies

Student education

I contribute to teaching on People, Environment and Sustainability, Critical Perspectives on Environment and Development, Sustainable Development in Practice and Environmental Policy and Governance. I also contribute to teaching on Land, Fuel and Agriculture and The Political Economy of Resources. My broader teaching interests are Political Economy, Rural Development and Agrarian Political Economy.

Research groups and institutes

  • Sustainability Research Institute