Dr. Jesse Salah Ovadia

Dr Jesse Salah Ovadia is an Associate Professor in Political Science working in the areas of African political economy, the extractive industries and development, and sustainable energy transitions. He holds a PhD and MA in Political Science from York University (Canada) and a BA(Hons) in Development Studies and Politics from Queen’s University (Canada). 

Dr Ovadia is a member of the Editorial Board of Canadian Journal for Development Studies/Revue canadienne d’études du développement and a Contributing Editor to Review of African Political Economy. Before coming to Windsor, he was Lecturer in International Political Economy at Newcastle University in the UK.

Dr Ovadia has worked and as a consultant and advisor for the African Development Bank, UNDP, Natural Resource Governance Institute, Department for International Development (UK), Engineers without Borders, African Climate Foundation and the World Bank. He has volunteered as an election monitor in Ghana and speaks regularly at policy events organized by governments, international organizations, and the private sector.

Dr. Ovadia's research concerns African energy transitions and policies that promote state-led development such as local content policies in oil and gas as well as the politics that surrounds their implementation. Local content encourages local participation in and benefits from resource extraction. He is interested in the promise and pitfalls of these policies in terms of national governance, local participation, community development, industrial growth and domestic and international relations. More broadly, this topic extends to encompass a range of political and economic questions around development and underdevelopment, economic diversification, employment and unemployment, and best practices/lessons learned in the implementation and continuous monitoring of local content. 

• POLS 1600  Introduction to International Relations
• POLS 2410  Introduction to African Politics
• POLS 2520  Modern Political Thought
• POLS 3520  Political Problems of Economic Development
• POLS 4310  Seminar in Comparative Politics
• POLS 4410  The New Scramble for African Resources
• POLS 8330  International Political Economy
• POLS 8350  Globalization, Poverty and Development

Books​

• 2016. The Petro-Developmental State in Africa: Making Oil Work in Angola, Nigeria and the Gulf of Guinea. London: Hurst.
• 2016. Energy, Capitalism, and World Order: Toward A New Agenda in International Political Economy. Basingstoke, UK: Palgrave Macmillan. Co-edited with T. Di Muzio
• 2019. Developmental States Beyond East Asia. London: Routledge. Co-edited with JT Nem Singh
• 2022. Natural Resource-Based Development in Africa: Panacea or Pandora’s Box? Toronto: University of Toronto Press. Co-edited with N Andrews and JA Grant

Articles and book chapters

• Saunders, RG, L Mlambo, & JS Ovadia (2023) ‘Resource Nationalism in Zimbabwe: Alternative Visions and Policy Realities’ Journal of Southern African Studies. 49(3): 477-499.
• Ovadia, JS & ME Amoafo (2023) ‘Creating a Gender-Sensitive Extractive Bargain in Tanzania Through Local Content and Women’s Economic Empowerment’ in P Bowles and N Andrews (eds.) Extractive Bargains: Natural Resources and the State-Society Nexus. Cham, Switzerland: Palgrave Macmillan, 2023.
• Ayelazuno, JA & JS Ovadia (2022) ‘Ocean and land grabbing in Ghana's offshore petroleum industry: From the agrarian question to the question of industrialization’ Journal of Agrarian Change, 22(4): 673-702.
• Ovadia, JS & E Graham (2022) ‘The Resource Curse and Limits of Petro-Development in Ghana’s “Oil City”: How Oil Production Has Impacted Sekondi-Takoradi’ in N Andrews, JA Grant, & JS Ovadia (eds) Natural Resource-Based Development in Africa: Panacea or Pandora’s Box? Toronto: University of Toronto Press.
• Andrews, A, JA Grant, JS Ovadia, & A Sneyd (2022) ‘An Evolving Agenda on Natural Resource–Based Development in Africa’ in N Andrews, JA Grant, & JS Ovadia (eds) Natural Resource-Based Development in Africa: Panacea or Pandora’s Box? Toronto: University of Toronto Press.
• Ovadia JS (2022) ‘Addressing gender inequality through employment and procurement: Local content in Tanzania's emerging gas industry’ The Extractive Industries and Society. 9, 101028.
• Ovadia JS (2021) ‘Local Content, Angolanização, and Sustainable Development in Angola’ in Damilola S. Olawuyi (ed.) Local Content and Sustainable Development in Global Energy Markets. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
• Ovadia, JS, JA Ayelazuno & J van Alstine (2020) ‘Ghana’s petroleum industry: expectations, frustrations and anger in coastal communities’ Journal of Modern African Studies. 58(3): 397-424.
• Ovadia, JS (2020) ‘Natural Resources and African Economies: Asset or Liability?’ in T Falola and SO Oloruntoba (eds.) Palgrave Handbook of African Political Economy. Cham, Switzerland: Palgrave MacMillan.
• Otchere-Darko, W & JS Ovadia (2020) ‘Incommensurable languages of value and petro-geographies: Land-use, decision-making and conflict in South-Western Ghana’ Geoforum. 113: 69-80.
• Hilson, AE & JS Ovadia (2020) ‘Local Content in Developing and Middle-Income Countries: Towards a More Holistic Strategy’ The Extractive Industries and Society. 7(2): 253-262.
• Ovadia, JS (2019) ‘Local Content in Tanzania’s gas and minerals sectors: Who regulates?’ in O Fjeldstad, D Mmari, and K Dupuy (eds.) Governing Petroleum Resources: Prospects and Challenges for Tanzania. Bergen: Chr. Michelsen Institute and Dar es Salaam: REPOA.
• Graham, E & JS Ovadia (2019) ‘Oil exploration and production in Sub-Saharan Africa, 1990-present: Trends and developments’ The Extractive Industries and Society. 6(2): 593-609.
• Nem Singh, JT & JS Ovadia (2018) ‘The theory and practice of building developmental states in the Global South’ Third World Quarterly. 39(6): 1033-1055.
• Ovadia, JS & C Wolf (2018) ‘Studying the developmental state: theory and method in research on industrial policy and state-led development in Africa’ Third World Quarterly. 39(6): 1056-1076.
• Ovadia, JS (2018) ‘Civil Society and Petroleum Management in Angola’ in Indra Overland (ed.) Public Brainpower: Civil Society and Natural Resource Management. Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan.
• Ovadia, JS (2018) ‘State-Led Industrial Development, Structural Transformation and Elite-Led Plunder: Angola (2002-2013) as a Developmental State’ Development Policy Review. 36(5): 587-606.
• Ovadia, JS (2017) ‘Local Content in Tanzania’s Gas and Minerals Sectors: Who regulates?’ Policy Brief for the Tanzania as a Future Petro-State Project. CMI Brief Vol 16, No. 6; REPOA Brief No. 41. Oslo and Dar es Salaam: Chr. Michelsen Institute (CMI) and Policy Research for Development (REPOA).
• De Grassi, A & JS Ovadia (2017) ‘Trajectories of Large-Scale Land Acquisition Dynamics in Angola: Diversity, Histories and Implications for the Political Economy of Development in Africa’ Land Use Policy. 67: 115-125.
• Ovadia, JS & S Croese (2016) ‘Post-War and Oil-Rich Angola: The Dual Nature of Growth Without Development’ in G Kanyenze, H Jauch, AD Kanengoni, M Madzwamuse, and D Muchena (eds.) Towards Democratic Developmental States in Southern Africa. Harare: Weaver Press
• Ovadia, JS (2017) ‘Local Content Policies, Natural Resource Governance and Development in the Global South’ in H Besada (ed.) Governing Natural Resources for Africa’s Development. London: Routledge.
• Ovadia, JS (2016) ‘Local Content Policies and Petro-Development in Sub-Saharan Africa: A Comparative Analysis’ Resources Policy. 49: 20-30.
• The IGLP Law and Global Production Working Group (2016) ‘Recognising the Constitutive Role of Law in Global Value Chains: A Research Manifesto,’ London Review of International Law. 4(1): 57-79.
• Ovadia, JS (2016) ‘Oil-Backed Capitalist Development in the Global South: A Case of Positive Oil Exceptionalism?’ in T Di Muzio & JS Ovadia (eds.) Energy, Capitalism and World Order: Toward a New Agenda in International Political Economy. Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan.
• Di Muzio, T & JS Ovadia (2016) ‘Energy, Capitalism and World Order in IPE’ in T Di Muzio & JS Ovadia (eds.) Energy, Capitalism and World Order: Toward a New Agenda in International Political Economy. Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan.
• Ovadia, JS (2015) ‘State-Led development in Angola and the Challenge of Agriculture and Rural Development’ Portuguese Studies Review. 23(2): 191-214.
• Ovadia, JS (2014) ‘Local Content and Natural Resource Governance’ The Extractive Industries and Society. 1(2): 137-146.
• JS Ovadia (2013) ‘Local Content and State-Led Development in Angola’ Mulemba - Revista Angolana de Ciências Sociais. Faculdade de Ciências Sociais (FCS), Universidade Agostinho Neto (UAN), Luanda. 3(6): 105-138.
• Ovadia, JS (2013) ‘The Nigerian “One Percent” and the Management of National Oil Wealth Through Nigerian Content,’ Science & Society. 77(3): 315-341.
• Ovadia, JS (2013) ‘Accumulation With or Without Dispossession? A ‘Both/And’ Approach to China in Africa with reference to Angola,’ Review of African Political Economy. 40(136): 233-250.
• Ovadia, JS (2013) ‘The Reinvention of Elite Accumulation in Angola: Emergent Capitalism in a Rentier Economy’ Cadernos de Estudos Africanos. 25: 33-63.
• Ovadia, JS (2013) ‘Indigenization vs. Domiciliation: A Historical Approach to National Content in Nigeria’s Oil and Gas Industry’ in Falola, T & J Achberger (eds.) The Political Economy of Development and Underdevelopment in Africa. London: Routledge.
• Ovadia, JS (2013) ‘The Making of Oil-backed Indigenous Capitalism in Nigeria’ New Political Economy. 18(2): 258-283.
• Ovadia, JS (2012) ‘The Dual Nature of Local Content in Angola’s Oil and Gas Industry: Development vs. Elite Accumulation’ Journal of Contemporary African Studies. 30(3): 395-417.
• Ovadia, JS (2011) ‘Stepping Back from the Brink: A Review of the 2008 Ghanaian Election from the Capital of the Northern Region’ Canadian Journal of African Studies. 45(2): 310-340.
• Ovadia, JS (2008) ‘Development and security in Africa’s ‘American Lake’: the political economy of oil and exploitation’ in M Ayyash & C Hendershot (eds.) Violent Interventions. Toronto: York Centre for International and Security Studies.