Barnaby's research lies at the intersection of the so-called Rising Southern Powers, especially India and Brazil, their international relations and development cooperation, and the political economy of infrastructure in Africa. He analyses international policymaking, tracing decisions made in global cities from Washington DC to Mumbai and London, to national planning and then to individual projects and the impacts they have on economies, people and the environment.

Barnaby interests therefore lie in the political economy of development and key trends in decision making and practice and his teaching focuses on these themes, from a boom in dams in Africa, to adoption of financialisation by Western donors and the evolution of ‘Southern’ donors like China and India. His current book project, under contract with Oxford University Press, examines an infrastructure boom in Africa starting in the early 2000s and lasting for nearly two decades, which has now given way to debt crises, the covid-19 pandemic and global inflation crisis. This boom marks a first era of development in the 21^st Century, and the book examines the political economy of this boom, from its global drivers to its national politics. The book’s main argument is that strategic and economic drivers where interwoven with ideology which shaped the types of projects chosen and the way they were built. This amounts to an evolution in modernist ideas for how development is envisioned, how it is assumed to work and what it aesthetically looks like.

Barnaby has also conducted extensive research into India’s foreign policy, especially with Africa and the global South, and its evolution as a development donor. He also maintains active research on the electricity sector in Africa, with publications analysing electricity booms in Ghana, Rwanda and Tanzania, and current research on political economy of the green transition on the continent.

Barnaby joined the Department for International Development at King’s College, London in 2024.

Barnaby is a political economist, with research that lies at the intersection of infrastructure in Africa and the so-called Rising Southern Powers, especially India and Brazil. This involves analysing international policymaking, tracing decisions about finance and diplomacy in global cities like Washington DC and Delhi, to national economic planning and then to individual infrastructure projects and the impacts they have on economies, people and the environment.

This interest grew from reading Geography at the University of Cambridge, completing a Master’s at King’s College, London and then a doctorate in politics at the University of Oxford. He studied the resurgence of dam building in Africa, examining its international roots, national-level decision making and local impacts. During his time in Oxford, Barnaby also led the Oxford University China-Africa Forum and Oxford Central Africa Forum.

Barnaby then joined the University of Manchester’s Global Development Institute, leading research for FutureDAMS Research Consortium in Ghana and India as well as undertaking policy impact work. He then started a permanent lectureship at the University of York in 2022 and was a ESRC Policy Fellow working in UK Government between 2022-2024.

• Indian Foreign Policy; Indian development cooperation; India-Africa relations;
• South-South Relations; China, Brazil and India in Africa
• Political economy of infrastructure and electricity
• Dams and hydropower
• Ideologies of development; Modernisation ideas
• Political economy and political ecology
• Ghana, Rwanda, Tanzania, Ethiopia