Stephanie Leder

 Stephanie's latest research explores community-managed irrigation systems in contexts of rural out-migration in Nepal, the feminization of agriculture and collective action in natural resource governance. She currently leads two projects:

Revitalizing community-managed irrigation systems in contexts of out-migration in Nepal (FORMAS, 4.5 Mio. SEK, 2019-2027)

This project is a Mobility Grant of FORMAS, the Swedish Research Council for Environment, Agricultural Sciences and Spatial Planning with collaborations as visiting scientist/fellow at IDE (UK), UBC (Canada), SIAS (Nepal) and UNU-EHS (Germany).

The Future of Agrarian Mountain Livelihoods (FAML): Youth Aspirations and Irrigation Modernisation in Nepal (FORMAS, 4 Mio. SEK, 2024-2028)

This project aims to generate a new understanding of how water resource governance can become more youth-inclusive. It's a 4-year early career FORMAS grant project in collaboration with Gitta Shrestha as PhD student, Dr Marien Gonzalez-Hidalgo (SLU) and Dr Amina Maharjan (ICIMOD) and Prof. Jonathan Rigg (Bristol).

Stephanie is also the Study Director of the Research School "People, Society and Sustainability" at SLU. 

From 2014-2017 she was a Postdoctoral Fellow for Gender, Poverty and Institutions at the International Water Management Institute (IWMI) in Nepal, and led studies in inter- and transdisciplinary projects within the Consultative Group of International Agricultural Research (CGIAR) Program “Water, Land and Ecosystems” in India, Nepal and Bangladesh.

She holds a PhD in Human Geography from the University of Cologne, Germany. She studied geography, English, biology and educational sciences at the University of Cologne and the University of New Brunswick, Canada. For her PhD thesis, she conducted empirical research on Education for Sustainable Development in policy, textbooks and practice by examining geography teaching on water resources at secondary schools in Pune, India. Her book "Transformative Pedagogic Practice" is published with Springer 2018.

My research explores marginalization processes in natural resource governance and rural development. I combine social and environmental justice scholarship with feminist political ecology, critical development, collective action and commons studies to explore just socio-ecological transformations. My work in South Asia promotes insights into processes of social exclusion due to intersections of gender, age, ethnicity, class and caste characteristics at multiple scales (household, village, district, development programming, national and policy level). 

I teach at Bachelor, Master and PhD level on:

Environmental governance (water governance, land governance)
(Feminist) Political Ecology
Interdisciplinary and transdisciplinary research methods and practices
Food Security in the Global South
Environment and Society: Water Resource Management and Gender Relations
Development Studies

Education for Sustainable Development

PhD supervision

Gitta Shrestha (SLU): Youth Aspirations and Irrigation Modernisation in Nepal (FORMAS, main supervisor)

Happiness Mlula (SLU/Ardhi University Tanzania): Water governance in small towns: The role of local actors in domestic water service provision in Kabuku, Tanzania (SIDA, main supervisor)

Mia Ågren (SLU): Rethinking Landscape Justice at the Intersections of Densification and Urban Greening in Uppsala municipality, Sweden (FORMAS, co-supervisor)

Sarthak Shukla (SLU/IIIT Hyderabad): The end of coal and the future of land: Transformative mine closures for just and sustainable livelihoods in India (Vetenskapsrådet, Swedish Research Council, co-supervisor)

Alice Najabo (SLU/University of Rwanda): School Feeding Programs and food system transformation in rural Rwanda (SIDA, co-supervisor)

Leder, S., van der Geest, K., Upadhyaya, R., Adhikari, Y., Büttner, M. (2024): “Rural out-migration and water governance: Gender and social relations mediate and sustain irrigation systems in Nepal” World Development 177. 106544.
 

Leder, S. (2024): “Translocal resource governance, social relations and aspirations: Linking translocality and feminist political ecology to explore farmer-managed irrigation systems and migration in Nepal”. Geoforum 148. 103905.
 

Hajdu, F., Rigg, J., Bergman-Lodin, J, Fischer, K., Marquardt, K., Khatri, D., Leder, S. et al. (2024): Rendering smallholders social: Taking a social relations approach to understanding the persistence of smallholders in the rural Global South. Journal of Rural Studies 2024 Vol. 111. 103432.
 

Leder, S. (2022): “Beyond the “Feminisation of Agriculture”: Rural out-migration, changing gender relations and emerging spaces in natural resource management” Journal of Rural Studies 91. 157-169.
 

Buisson, M.-C., Clement, F., Leder, S.: “Empowerment and the will to change: Evidence from Nepal.” Journal of Rural Studies 94: 128-139.
 

Gonda, N., Leder, S., González-Hidalgo, M., Chiwona- Karltun, L., Stiernström, A., Hajdu, F., Asztalos Morell, I. Fischer, K., Kadfak, A., Arvidsson, A. (2021): “Critical reflexivity in political ecology research: how can the coronavirus pandemic transform us into better researchers?” Special Issue: Political Ecologies of COVID-19 in Frontiers in Political Ecology 3 (41).
 

Nguyen, T., Leder, S., Schruefer, G. (2021): “Recontextualising Education for Sustainable Development in pedagogic practice in Vietnam: linking Bernsteinian and constructivist perspectives.” Environmental Education Research 27 (3). 313-337.
 

Sugden, F., Agarwal, B.; Leder, S.; Saikia, P.; Raut, M.; Kumar, A.; Ray, D. (2020): “Experiments in farmer collectives in eastern India and Nepal: process, benefits and challenges.” Journal of Agrarian Change 21 (1). 90-121.
 

Ravula, P., Kasala, K., Pramanik, S., Duche, V., Yadav, U., Whitbread, A., Singh, R., Garg, K., Leder, S. (2020): “Gender transformative impacts from watershed interventions: Insights from a mixed methods study in the Bundelkhand region, India.” Transactions of the ASABE 63 (1): 153-163.
 

Leder, S., Sugden, F., Raut, M., Saikia, P., Dhananjay, J. (2019): “Ambivalences of collective farming: feminist political ecologies from Eastern India and Nepal.” International Journal of the Commons 13 (1): 105-129.
 

Clement, F., Buisson, M., Leder, S., Balasoubramanya, S., Bastakoti, R., Karki, E., van Koppen, B., Saikia, P. (2019): “Does women’s empowerment lead to enhanced food security? Revisiting dominant food and water security discourses.” Global Food Security 23: 160-172.
 

Leder, S., Das, D., Shrestha, G. (2019): “Transformative engagements with gender relations in agriculture and water resource management.” New Angle – Nepal Journal of Social Science and Public Policy 5 (1): 128-158. 
 

Leder, S., Clement, F., Karki, E. (2017): “Reframing women’s empowerment in water security programs in Western Nepal” Gender and Development 25 (2): 235-251.
 

Leder, S., Bharucha, E. (2015): “Changing the Educational Landscape in India by Transnational Policies: New Perspectives Promoted through Education for Sustainable Development (ESD)” ASIEN 134 (1): 167-192.
 

Chandramukhee, Leder, S. (2013): ”Dowry practices and gendered space in urban Patna/India” Gender Forum 42: 54-69.

Leder, S., Khatri, D., Ojha, H. (2019): “Water security and inclusive water governance in the Himalayas” New Angle: Nepal Journal of Social Science and Public Policy 5 (1): 1-6. Special issue with 6 research articles and 2 commentary papers. (contribution: shared work among three co-editors, about 33%).
 

Tavenner, K., Leder, S., Castellanos, P., David, S. (2023): “Innovations in Gender Research for Sustainable Food Systems” Frontiers in Sustainable Food Systems. Special Issue with 13 research articles.

Leder, S. (2018): “Transformative Pedagogic Practice. Education for Sustainable Development and Water Conflicts in Indian Geography Education” Singapore: Springer Publisher. Education for Sustainability Book Series. 308 p. ISBN 9789811323683

Leder, S., Shrestha, G., Upadhyaya, R., Adhikari, Y. (2021): COVID-19, gender and small-scale farming in Nepal. In: Castellanos, P., Sachs, C., Tickamyer, A.: Gender, Food, and COVID-19. Global Stories of Harm and Hope. New York: Routledge. 3-12.
 

Arora-Jonsson, S., Leder, S. (2020): “Gender mainstreaming in agricultural and forestry institutions” In: Sachs, C, Jensen, L., Sexsmith, K.: Routledge Handbook of Gender and Agriculture. New York: Routledge. 15-31.
 

Pyburn, R., Kruijssen, F., Newton, J., Allen, P., Sexsmith, K., Ransom, E., Alston, M., Brandth, B., Arora-Jonsson, S., Southard, E., Jensen, L., Whitley, H., Mittal, S., Leder, S., Lope-Alzina, D., Ahern, M., Choudhury, A., Rajaratnam, S., Hoffelmeyer, M., Bryant, L. (2020): Epilogue: Gender, agriculture, and shifting food systems under coronavirus global pandemic. In: Sachs, C, Sexsmith, K., Jensen, L., Castellanos, P.: Routledge Handbook of Gender and Agriculture. New York: Routledge. 435-452.
 

Leder, S., Sachs, C. (2019): “Intersectional Perspectives on the Gender- Agriculture Nexus. Relational life histories and additive indices” In: Sachs, C. (Ed.): Gender, Agriculture and Agrarian Transformations. Changing Relations in Africa, Latin America and Asia. New York: Routledge. 75-92.
 

Leder, S. (2015): „Feldforschung, Dokumentenanalyse, und Aktionsforschung – Ein geographiedidaktisches Forschungsdesign für den internationalen Kontext” In: Budke, A., Kuckuck, M.: Geographiedidaktische Forschungsmethoden. Berlin: Praxis neue Kulturgeographie. Lit-Verlag. 269-291.
 

Leder, S. (2015): „Bildung für nachhaltige Entwicklung durch Argumentation im Geographieunterricht” In: Budke, A. et al.: Fachlich Argumentieren lernen. Münster: Waxmann. 138- 150.
 

Leder, S. (2014): „Barrieren und Möglichkeiten einer Bildung für nachhaltige Entwicklung in Indien” In: Hemmer, I., Müller, M. & Trappe, M. (Hrsg.): Nachhaltigkeit neu denken. Rio + X. Impulse für Bildung und Wissenschaft. München: Oekom-Verlag. 195-201.

Participatory Gender Training for Community Groups. Experiences from Nepal. IWMI-media, 12 minute documentation

Participatory Gender Training in Nepal. Film