ERSA understands that research benefits from multiple contributors, including those from the public sector, the private sector, as well as local and international institutions. Creating research partnerships, developing new data and conducting leading-edge research is time-consuming; it is also potentially costly and risky. The pressure on South African academics to raise external funds in support of their research is growing as academics need to balance teaching commitments and research commitments.

As part of our mandate to support strong economic research, we have developed the Lerumo Intellectual Support Program (LISP). This initiative aims to deepen and strengthen international relationships and develop new and flexible research ideas and networks. We are therefore requesting proposals that are aligned with research that is relevant to any of ERSA’s primary research themes:

• Macroeconomic policy co-ordination
• Growth, development and structural constraints
• Macroeconomic analysis models
• Public finance
• Policy implications of climate change

How it works

LISP supports the development of large research projects that have academic salience and the potential to shape economic policy. The intention is to provide funding that academics can leverage as a catalyst towards new ideas, additional funds and further opportunities for their community of researchers at various academic or policy institutions, to pursue more impactful research over the longer term. Therefore, proposals should delineate a clear contribution to the broader academic literature, including the relevant policy question(s) to be addressed by the research. The academic contribution should be placed into a larger context that pushes the boundaries of our knowledge.

In exchange for support, the working papers derived from the LISP research, should be submitted to the Economic Research Southern Africa Working Paper Series. It is further expected that at least one policy paper, inclusive of an executive summary “policy brief”, will also be submitted. The research itself, is to be owned by the researcher, although ERSA reserves the right to market and communicate results from the research to the broader academic and policy community. It is also presumed that a primary goal of undertaking research is the development of a research profile, inclusive of publications in top international journals. Thus, potential publication outlets are an important component of the proposal process. We suggest the inclusion of three journal possibilities and appropriate motivation for those choices.

Get Involved

To find out more about the Lisp program, click below.