Institute of Development Studies (IDS)
Bio
Author Biography
Stephen Thompson is a social scientist who has worked across the disciplines of geography and international development since 2007. He is a Fellow in the Participation Inclusion, and Social Change cluster at the Institute of Development Studies. His research mainly focuses on the themes of disability inclusion and social justice. He is particularly interested in participatory methods. His doctoral thesis focused on the social and economic impact of avoidable blindness and visual impairment in Mozambique.
Institute of Development Studies (IDS)
Bio
Author Biography
Brigitte Rohwerder is a Researcher in the Participation, Inclusion and Social Change research cluster. Her current work mainly focuses on themes of social justice and inclusion, particularly disability inclusion in low-income contexts, using participatory methods. Her research interests include disability stigma, forced displacement, and marginalised groups’ experiences of conflict, crises and humanitarian response.
Sightsavers
Bio
Author Biography
Claire Walsh is currently the Deputy Programme Director of the Disability Inclusive Development programme at Sightsavers. Previous roles focused on monitoring, evaluation and learning and organisational change. She has close to 20 years of experience working in the international development sector across West and East Africa and India, Bangladesh and Nepal on disability inclusion, education, health and livelihoods programmes. She holds a master’s degree in public policy from Simon Fraser University, Canada.
International Disability Alliance (IDA)
Bio
Author Biography
Gayatri Sekar, International Disability Alliance (IDA), works on learning products built through community engagement. Coming from southern India with lived experience of psychosocial disability, Gayatri applies a decolonial approach to inclusive research and learning, the production and dissemination of knowledge, and community engagement in the global South.
Volume 57
Number 1
Published: March 16, 2026
An estimated 1.3 billion people worldwide experience disability and are a part of human diversity. People with disabilities remain underrepresented in development programmes and research. People with disabilities must be included in development initiatives to ensure that no one is left behind. This issue presents a collection of articles written by researchers and practitioners involved in the UK aid-funded Disability Inclusive Development (DID) programme. The articles explore a range of topics relating to disability and development such as health, education, safeguarding, transport, stigma, including the most marginalised groups, the imperative role of Organisations of Persons with Disabilities, and disability-inclusive approaches to research and evaluations. This issue presents robust evidence produced under the DID programme to show what is known, makes practical suggestions for what needs to be done to achieve inclusion going forward, and highlights persisting evidence and funding gaps.
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