Chair of Social Sciences; Associate Professor of Political Economy
Chair, Department of Social Sciences and Associate Professor of Political Economy
Grieve Chelwa, Chair of the Department of Social Sciences and Associate Professor of Political Economy at The Africa Institute, brings extensive expertise from his distinguished career. Previously, he served as Director of Research at the Institute on Race, Power, and Political Economy at The New School and as Senior Lecturer in Economics at the University of Cape Town’s Graduate School of Business, where he also directed the MBA program. Chelwa was the inaugural postdoctoral fellow at the Center for African Studies at Harvard University and a visiting postdoctoral fellow at the Wits Institute for Social and Economic Research (WISER) at the University of the Witwatersrand. He is also a non-resident Senior Fellow at Tricontinental: Institute for Social Research.
His scholarly contributions have appeared in prestigious journals, including the Journal of Economic Literature, Applied Economics Letters, Social Science & Medicine, Daedalus: Journal of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, Economy and Society, PLOS ONE, British Medical Journal, Energy Policy, and the South African Journal of Economics, among others. His research has received support from notable foundations, including the Carnegie Foundation, the Gates Foundation, Bloomberg Philanthropies, and the Open Society Foundations. He is a prolific commentator on African economic matters, with his insights published in prominent media outlets such as The New York Times, The Washington Post, Bloomberg, CGTN, BBC, Mail & Guardian, People’s Dispatch, Lusaka Times, and Business Day. In 2023, Chelwa was appointed advisory board member for Economists For Future.
Chelwa earned his Ph.D. in Economics from the University of Cape Town, where he focused on the economics of tobacco control in Africa. His academic journey includes a Master's degree in Economics from the University of Cape Town and a Bachelor's degree in Economics from the University of Zambia.
Research
Chelwa's research focuses on political economy, particularly its implications on the prospects for African economic development.
Chelwa, Grieve. 2023. “CODESRIA Bulletin Online, No. 9, October 2023 - Development, Development Cooperation and Africa in the Twenty-First Century”.
Chelwa, Grieve, Darrick Hamilton, and Avi Green. "Identity group stratification, political economy & inclusive economic rights." Dædalus 152, no. 1 (2023): 154-167.
Chelwa, Grieve, Darrick Hamilton, and James Stewart. "Stratification economics: Core constructs and policy implications." Journal of Economic Literature 60, no. 2 (2022): 377-399.
Amarante, Verónica, Ronelle Burger, Grieve Chelwa, John Cockburn, Ana Kassouf, Andrew McKay, and Julieta Zurbrigg. "Underrepresentation of developing country researchers in development research." Applied economics letters 29, no. 17 (2022): 1659-1664.
Chelwa, Grieve. "Does economics have an ‘Africa problem’?." Economy and Society 50, no. 1 (2021): 78-99.
Chelwa, Grieve. “Pop Developmentalism in Africa”. CODESRIA Bulletin, no.1(2020): 1-5
Nyagwachi, Abel, Grieve Chelwa, and Corne van Walbeek. “The effect of tobacco & alcohol control policies on household spending patterns in Kenya: An approach using Matched Difference in Differences”. Social Science and Medicine 256, (2020): 113029
Chelwa, Grieve, Miquel Pellicer, and Mashekwa Maboshe. “Teacher Pay and Educational Outcomes: Evidence from the Rural Hardship Allowance in Zambia”. South African Journal of Economics 87, no. 3(2019): 255-282.
Maboshe, Mashekwa, Akabondo Kabechani, and Grieve Chelwa. “The welfare effects of unprecedented price hikes in Zambia”. Energy Policy 126, (2019):108-117
Chelwa, Grieve and Steven F. Koch. “The effect of tobacco expenditure on expenditure shares in South African households: A genetic matching approach”. PLoS One 14, no. 9(2019): e0222000
Book Chapter
Bhorat, Haroon, Grieve Chelwa, Karmen Naidoo, and Benjamin Stanwix. “Resource Dependence and Inequality in Africa: Impacts, consequences and potential solutions”. In Income Inequality Trends in sub-Saharan Africa, edited by Ayodele Odusola et al., 129-148. New York: United Nations Development Programme, 2017.
Book Reviews
Grieve Chelwa. “Innovating Development Strategies in Africa: the role of international, national and regional actors by Landry Signe”. Journal of Modern African Studies 58, no. 1(2020): 161-162
Grieve Chelwa. “Zambia: Building Prosperity from Resource Wealth by Collier et al. (Eds)”. Enterprise and Society 18, no. 1(2017): 229-231
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