Alexia Adhikari

I am a PhD Candidate in the Department of Anthropology and Development Studies within the University of Adelaide, supervised by Emeritus Professor John Gray and Professor Andrew Skuse.

My doctoral research examines the political and social dynamics surrounding market-oriented social policy reform in Nepal since 1990, by focusing on case studies from the education, health, and water supply sectors. By employing a comparative approach, my research seeks to identify the political and social conditions under which social policy reform has occurred in Nepal and in doing so, contribute to wider discussions about the political and social pre-conditions for social policy reform in ‘fragile’ or ‘post-conflict’ states more generally. This concern is in turn linked to questions about the impact of particular political and social constellations on the realisation of citizens’ social rights, specifically rights of access to quality public services in such countries.