DV465 Half Unit
Labour, Social Services and Development
This information is for the 2025/26 session.
Course Convenor
Dr Tine Hanrieder
Availability
This course is available on the MSc in Development Management (Political Economy), MSc in Development Management (Political Economy) (LSE and Sciences Po), MSc in Development Studies, MSc in Economic Policy for International Development, MSc in Gender, Development and Globalisation, MSc in Health Policy, Planning and Financing, MSc in Health and International Development, MSc in Human Resources and Organisations (Human Resource Management/CIPD), MSc in Human Resources and Organisations (International Employment Relations/CIPD), MSc in Human Rights, MSc in Human Rights and Politics, MSc in Inequalities and Social Science, MSc in International Development and Humanitarian Emergencies and MSc in Urbanisation and Development. This course is freely available as an outside option to students on other programmes where regulations permit. It does not require permission. This course uses controlled access as part of the course selection process.
How to apply: Places will be allocated with priority to ID and joint-degree students. If there are more ID and joint-degree students than can be accommodated, these places will be allocated randomly. Non-ID/Joint Degree students will be allocated to spare places by random selection with the preference given first to those degrees where the regulations permit this option.
Deadline for application: You should make your request to take ID courses by 12 noon Friday 26 September 2025.
You will be informed of the outcome by 12 noon Monday 29 September 2025.
Students do not need to write a statement to apply for this course.
For queries contact: intdev.enquiries@lse.ac.uk
Course content
Development relies on a global workforce of health, care, and education workers in the public, voluntary/informal, and increasingly the private sector. This course examines this global workforce and the politics of labour for social development. It examines a set of cross-cutting development themes including the politics of training and skills, workforce migration and brain drain, and gendered and racialized divisions of labour. Students will learn to critically analyse debates about public sector wages in development strategies, the politics of professionalism and precarization, the role of volunteering and unpaid work, the moral and political economies of “corruption”, the gains and losses incurred from labour migration, worker power and the role of trade unions and international NGOs for the workplace, communities, and the state.
The course is broadly grounded in labour studies and feminist theories of social reproduction and care, and draws on research in disciplines including sociology, medical anthropology, political science, labour history, and public administration. It has a global outlook, working with case studies and examples from different regions and continents. It is both hands-on by unpacking current workforce challenges for development, and critical by uncovering historical roots of these challenges and mobilizing social theory to interpret them.
Teaching
15 hours of seminars and 15 hours of lectures in the Winter Term.
This course has a reading week in Week 6 of Winter Term.
Formative assessment
Essay plan
Students will be expected to produce 1 essay plan in the WT.
Formative feedback on the essay plan is provided.
Indicative reading
- Chambers-Ju, Christopher 2024: Mobilizing Teachers: Education Politics and the New Labor Movement in Latin America. Cambridge University Press.
- Maes, Kenneth 2017: The Lives of Community Health Workers: Local Labor and Global Health in Urban Ethiopia. Routledge.
- Marks, Shula 1994: Divided Sisterhood: Race, Class and Gender in the South African Nursing Profession. Wits University Press.
- Rodriguez, Robyn Magalit 2010: Migrants for Export: How the Philippine State Brokers Labor to the World. University of Minnesota Press.
- Wichterich, Christa & Maya John (eds.) 2023: Who Cares?: Care Extraction and the Struggles of Indian Health Workers. Zubaan Books.
Assessment
Presentation (15%)
Essay (85%, 3000 words) in Spring Term Week 1
Key facts
Department: International Development
Course Study Period: Winter Term
Unit value: Half unit
FHEQ Level: Level 7
CEFR Level: Null
Keywords: Labour, International development, Social reproduction, Teachers, Health workers, Public sector work, Education, Global health, Migration, Feminism, Precarity, Care, Human resources
Total students 2024/25: Unavailable
Average class size 2024/25: Unavailable
Controlled access 2024/25: NoCourse selection videos
Some departments have produced short videos to introduce their courses. Please refer to the course selection videos index page for further information.
Personal development skills
- Self-management
- Team working
- Problem solving
- Communication