POST GRADUATE DIPLOMA IN POVERTY ANALYSIS

Introduction

The Post-graduate Diploma Programme in Poverty Analysis is a part-time 10 months programme of international standard with specific emphasis on imparting investigative skills and research capabilities for Applied Policy Analysis. Its substantive focus concerns the (interdisciplinary) study of issues of poverty, vulnerability and social protection. Its explicit emphasis is on teaching the practice of research for policy-analysis. The programme is policy-oriented, skills-intensive and interdisciplinary in nature.

Where is it located and who is delivering it?
The programme is located at and will be delivered from ESRF and REPOA, both based in Dar es Salaam and both research and capacity-building institutions, which over time have accumulated considerable local experience in workshop-based training in policy analysis in general, and socio-economic poverty analysis in particular.

To secure a recognised international standard and standing, the diploma will be delivered in collaboration with the Institute of Social Studies (ISS, The Hague, The Netherlands), who will also sanction the diploma. ISS is an institution with which ESRF and REPOA have a longstanding collaboration in the area of capacity building (through the delivery of short skill-intensive research-oriented workshops) and which has considerable international experience in research and in the delivery of postgraduate diplomas and degrees within this area of expertise.

What are the overall Objectives of the Course?

Specific objectives
1) The development objective is to make a contribution towards enhancing the quality and effectiveness of policies concerned with poverty reduction and protection of the poor.

2) The underlying main objective is to enhance research capabilities for policy analysis in institutions of higher learning, government and public sector departments and institutions, NGOs, private sector consultancy firms, and donor agencies.

3) A third objective is to develop the capabilities of ESRF and REPOA to further their mandates of providing effective and efficient training in capacity building for poverty reduction and the social protection of the poor in Tanzania.

Target audience
The programme is targeting young and mid-career professionals in Tanzania (and, potentially, also within the wider region), who are pursuing or seek to pursue a career in research and policy analysis, working for either Ministries, other public institutions, NGOs, consultancy firms or donor agencies, and who seek to acquire investigative skills for both policy analysis on issues of poverty, vulnerability and social protection.

Rationale
The diploma programme has three distinctive characteristics, which together define its specific rationale:
- It is explicitly focused on poverty, vulnerability and social protection;
- It is explicitly directed towards the practice of research and policy-analysis;
- It is delivered through distance learning coupled with face-to-face intensive workshops. This mixed mode of delivery is designed to meet the need of working professionals;

Course structure & coverage

The programme involves part-time study of a 10-months period, divided into two semesters.  

SEMESTER 1

Substantive content

Research skills & capabilities
Conceptualising poverty: concepts, theories and measurements

This module explores the different approaches to the analysis of poverty, vulnerability and inequality, their conceptual tools and issues of measurement, from an interdisciplinary perspective.

Topics covered include:

·          Sorting Out Conceptions of Poverty

·          Looking at Economic Inequality and Relative Poverty

·          Measuring Absolute Poverty: Poverty Lines and Human Poverty Indices

·          Economic Growth, Inequality and Poverty

·          Trade Integration, Economic Growth and Poverty: Tanzania in the Global Context

·          How Poverty Works: Gender and the Market Divide

·          Vulnerability, Security and Impoverishment

·          Poverty and the Quality of Life: Capabilities and Livelihoods

·          Social Inequality, Redistribution and the “New” Politics of Inclusion 

 

 

 Alongside the teaching of substantive content, a set of practical research skills will be taught.

Doing a literature study

·          Doing a literature survey

·          Finding resources on the internet

·          Refereed literature versus policy documents and other grey materials

·          Skim reading, structured reading and note-taking (including referencing)

·          From survey to literature study: conceptualization in the research process

The practice of data exploration:

·          Competing explanations and evidence-based argumentation

·          Constructing a data matrix

·          Getting data on the internet

·          Principles and basic techniques in exploratory data analysis

·          Dealing with time and change

·          Doing a case study

·          Principles of qualitative data analysis in applied policy research

·          Assessing your evidence

 

 

SEMESTER 2

This semester consists of two sequential components: (1) a course of policy analysis for poverty reduction, and (2) a research project.

(2.1)

Substantive content

Research skills and capabilities
Policy analysis for poverty reduction

This module looks at theories and practices of policy contexts and interventions for poverty reduction and social protection within a broader perspective of pro-poor growth and development. Particular attention is given to the relations between economic growth and poverty reductions and between social and economic policies, both at macro and micro level, government-inspired or otherwise, including the dilemmas posed by financial and political implications and constraints.

 

Topics include:

·          The Relation between ‘Economic’ and ‘Social’ Policy in Poverty Reduction: Duality or Unity?

·          Context-Specific Poverty Reduction Strategies:  The Productivity-Employment Nexus

·          Trade Policy and Poverty Reduction 

·          Redistribution and Health Care

·          Free Primary Education: Are We Postponing Exclusion?

·          Operationalising the right to water?: assessing the potential of increasing block water tariffs

·          Policy on Poverty in Tanzania: An Historical Perspective

 

 

  

Apart from discussing general approaches to policy making for poverty reduction, this module also makes extensive use of case materials, both based on Tanzania and elsewhere.

 

 

 

Research skills involve general skills like:

·          Doing policy evaluation; policy evaluation as a research method

·          Using case studies in policy analysis

·          What can (and cannot) be learned from cross-country generalizations?

But it also teaches more specific skills (like, for example, benefit-incidence analysis) depending on the case studies used.

(2.2)

Research project 

Either,

an extended-research essay

This option is designed for students who take the diploma as a self-standing research-training programme.

Students are required to undertake a small research project involving evidence-based argumentation and to write it up in an extended research essay (no more than 9,000 words).

 

Or,

a worked-out research proposal

This option is designed for students who take the programme as a vehicle – an aid – to develop a research proposal to be subsequently submitted to obtain research funding (for example, to REPOA) or to gain admittance to a research degree.

Students are required to undertake the necessary research to develop a conceptually and empirically grounded research proposal (no more than 9,000 words).  

 

 How is the course going to be conducted?

Each semester consists of one 10-days intensive workshop (attendance of which is obligatory for the successful completion of the course) coupled with distance learning. The distance learning is accompanied by tutorial support and involves web-based text-conferencing between students (and tutors).  The diploma is assessed through exams (one per semester), essay/exercise writing, participation in discussion forums, and a short research project. 

At the start of each semester, every participant will receive a study-pack with course materials (study guides; textbooks; readings; audios; CD-ROMs; software packages for data analysis; and instructions for access to web-based conferencing and supportive materials). These study-packs will be self-contained, so participants will not need to acquire additional materials or rely on libraries. The research project, however, will require participants to look for and collect own materials related to their specific research topics and questions.

Access to a computer (with adequate capacity specifications) and access to the Internet is a prerequisite for participation in the course, and here employers’ support and personal initiatives are encouraged. 

After the Post-Graduate Diploma
The diploma is explicitly designed to be multi-purpose in scope inasmuch as: 

·      It can serve as a self-standing research-oriented training programme;

·      It can also serve as a formalized mentoring framework/course to assist junior researchers in acquiring the conceptual tools for developing a research proposal for an intended (subsequent) research project; 

·      It is further intended that, through teaching credit transfers, it can also be inserted as a first stage (part-fulfillment) towards obtaining a (research-) MA in poverty and/or policy analysis.   

What is the cost of the Programme?

A number of either full or partial fellowships are available on competitive basis.

Application procedures and minimum candidate requirements

Interested persons can apply by downloading the application form and fax it to us, deliver it to our office or post it to us. Each application must be supported by the relevant documents that have been specified in the application form.  The application needs to be sent to the following address:
        The Programme Coordinator

        Post Graduate Diploma Programme

        The Economic and Social Research Foundation (ESRF)
        P.O. Box 31226
        Dar es Salaam
        Tanzania
        Email: pgprogramme@esrf.or.tz or Fax: +255 22 2760062

The minimum entry qualifications are a good first degree (lower second) preferably in the social sciences with some background on quantitative methods and basic computer knowledge. A written support from the employer (for time and ICT) is also required.

For further enquiries, please send a mail to the e-mail address given above.