Ongoing Projects

Batoghato is pioneering communication project: a research-based graphic novel (a book that tells a story via drawings and text) that dramatizes the human stories within a pressing national issue, the politics of road construction in rural districts of Nepal.

Post-publication dissemination activities create contexts for discussion of the book’s themes, for participatory story-telling, and for introductory training so that others can use the graphic novel medium for socially-relevant stories.

This study analyses media reports to understand the changes in the patterns and routes of human trafficking from Nepal in the guise of migration. The study will also identify perpetrators, victims and trafficking-stoppers as reported in the media and analyse biases in the media reporting of human trafficking. One of the objectives of the study is to inform anti-trafficking policies and programs, and provide insights for the improvement of interventions to address human trafficking and support at-risk population in Nepal.

Project Description: This study aims to use the narratives of migrant workers to document the migration experience and identify the various intermediaries involved in facilitating migration for foreign employment. It will examine the interaction of migrant workers with various actors in the recruitment process, estimate the cumulative costs of transactions incurred as they work through agents and other intermediaries, identify various other services these intermediaries provide to migrant workers, such as lending money, and understand the strategies workers use to meet these costs. The study will also examine existing policies that govern and regulate the activities of the above-mentioned actors, and the actual practices, while taking heed of non-regulatory measures such as community-driven interventions, and examine how they help or hinder fair recruitment.

Project Description: The proposed study aims to identify existing gaps, barriers and challenges that both prohibit and inhibit men and women migrant workers from accessing justice with complaints related to recruitment, and also identify practical solutions and policy changes to address these issues. The findings of the study can also facilitate the objectives and commitments made in the Global Compact for Migration (GCM), and also help attain the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), especially (SDG 10.7) to facilitate fair and ethical recruitment and access to justice in case of violation of rights of migrant workers.

The purpose of this study is to explore and better understand the social and economic impacts of the global pandemic related reverse migration of an unprecedented number of migrant workers to Nepal. The proposed research has its policy relevance in identifying the immediate, mid-term, as well as long-term needs and concerns of returnee migrant workers and their families. This research will contribute empirically by conducting a comparative analysis of the impacts observed between the cross-border (India-Nepal) returnee migrants and international (besides India) returnee migrants.

Project Description: This project is about a study of the Provincial and Local Government Support Program (PLGSP), a multi-faceted intervention to build the capacity of local government units (LGs) to effectively administer their new powers. The programme is part of Nepal’s 2015 new constitution designed to transition the country to a federal state with three levels of government at federal, provincial and municipal level. This is the first study to provide a rigorous study of a nation-wide federalization on long-term outcomes. In this study, Social Science Baha is collaborating with Carolina Population Centre, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. The study team includes Co- PIs Sudhanshu Handa and Brigitte Seim (Zimmerman), Public Policy, University of North Carolina-Chapel Hill, Dr. Jeevan Baniya, Assistant Director, Social Science Baha, and Daniel Pamstein, Political Science, North Dakota State University (2020-2023). For more detail, please visit: https://cedilprogramme.org/funded-projects/programme-of-work-1/evaluating-governance-reform-using-a-case-control-approach

Project Description: The overall objective of the project is to take a critical look at the limitations of the existing data and highlight how the documentation on death, ill-treatment and injuries of migrant workers during transit and their employment in the destination countries can be improved. The findings from this study will be put in broader academic and policy conversation on death, injury and ill-treatment of migrant workers.

Project Description: This research aims to experimentally test whether seasonal a migration subsidy programme has positive impacts in addressing seasonal food insecurity in rural Nepal. It will also explore how migration may transform rural, agricultural labour markets by studying the effects of seasonal migration on both rural labour supply and labour demand.

Project Description: The overall objective of the project is to promote and protect freedom of religions or belief (FoRB) in South Asia by improved and more collaborative monitoring, reporting, and advocacy on FoRB violations. It specifically aims to strengthen the capacity of a regional researchers’ and activists’ network to monitor incidents, trends, and patterns of FoRB violations; produce and publish authoritative reports; and carry out linked advocacy to combat discrimination, intolerance, and violence against religious minorities, and improve protection of FoRB in South Asia Minority and human rights researchers, activists, and organisations working to promote FoRB across South Asia are direct beneficiaries. And, it will also serve minorities and particularly religious minorities and stateless groups in South Asia.

Project Description: The Centre for the Study of Labour and Mobility (CESLAM) at Social Science Baha is a partner organisation of the international collaborative research project on migration and agricultural and rural change (AGRUMIG). The research project seeks to explore the two-way interface between agrarian and environmental change in migrant-sending communities, offering comparative insights between seven countries – Nepal, China, Ethiopia, Thailand, Kyrgyzstan, Moldova and Morocco. 

The AGRUMIG project engages in an innovative Qualitative Comparative Analysis to better understand the unique economic, institutional and agro-ecological contexts which mediate particular relationships between migration and agriculture, as well as the role played by diverse governance actors throughout this process. It will in turn work with stakeholders through an iterative process of engagement to develop migration governance action plans which strengthen positive development and migration outcomes. More information on the project is available at http://agrumig.iwmi.org/.

Project Description: The Centre for the Study of Labour and Mobility (CESLAM) at Social Science Baha will provide technical support to the Government of Province 1 to develop approaches, methodological tools and indicators for a migration profile and throughout the execution of the profiling exercise. The migration profile will provide comprehensive provincial data on migration, including information on internal and international migration; in- and out-migration; migration for labour, education, and permanent settlement; skills and labour market integration of returnee migrants; and seasonal and long-term labour migration, to allow the provincial and local governments of Province 1 to optimise the benefits of migration. The profile will contribute to evidence-based policy through the use of data on migration in the policy-making and planning processes of different thematic sectors. The migration profile will serve as an important and useful tool to better understand and manage the diverse migration flows in the province.

Project Description: The study will examine how Nepal’s legal regime has changed over the past 13 years to make the country a much more inclusive state. The study will build on the paper ‘Gender, Caste and Ethnic Exclusion in the Law’ prepared by Bipin Adhikari and Bandita Sijapati in 2011. The said paper is thus far unpublished and the study will provide updates to the paper while also conducting original research. The study will conclude with the drafting and publication of the final report. It is envisaged that Part I of the report would trace the evolution of the legal changes up to the end of the first Constituent Assembly in 2012; Part II would continue with the thread of the narrative thereafter and bring it up to date till the adoption of the 2015 Constitution; and Part III will deal with the rollout of federalism and the adoption of the new Muluki Ain in 2017.