UN SDGs this project relates to:

Project number: OR2020-75979; OR2021-80988

Project funder: Open Society Foundation

Duration: 2021-2023

This project is supported by the Open Society Foundation (OSF), and conjointly coordinated by Oxford School for Global Studies (OSGA), and the Institute for Global Sustainable Development (IGSD). The OBO is a successor to the Belarus International Committee, set up by Doughty Street Chambers. OBO works in partnership with the Research Centre of Sviatlana Tsikhanouskaya's Office (OST), GLOBSEC Policy Institute, and COMPASS project.

Our Mission

The purpose of the Oxford Belarus Observatory (OBO) is to raise awareness, and provide expertise and knowledge about the contemporary issues facing Belarus today, including those related to the specifics of the COVID-19 pandemic and Russia’s war in Ukraine, and their enduring consequences. Most specifically, employing the insights unique to IGSD and OSGA, OBO supports and promotes evidence-based policy-making, knowledge brokering and stakeholder interaction through:

• the comprehensive and rigorous analysis of the impact of and responses to the challenges in the region, including COVID-19 and war in Ukraine, on Belarus;
• the analysis of social, economic, political, cultural and historical issues which shape contemporary Belarus and which can inform external understanding;
• engagement, wherever possible, with domestic stakeholders;
• the production of timely and reliable evidence in response to both real domestic policy needs but also external stakeholder initiatives; and
• the communication of evidence in ways that are useful to, and usable by, policy-makers, national and international civil society, the media and other non-academic stakeholders.

This background is reflected in the work of the Observatory, which commits to the following important principles.

Contemporary Relevance: OBO will speak to the most relevant and prescient social, economic, political, health and civil society challenges and opportunities facing Belarus.

Objectivity and Impartiality: while OBO is committed to brokering knowledge and furthering understanding, it can only do so to the extent that it remains objective, balanced, and impartial.

Analytical rigour: OBO will promote knowledge and understanding of contemporary Belarus society and in doing so will draw on established scholarly, scientific processes and practice in order to underscore objectivity and ensure analytical rigour.

Stakeholder benefit: OBO recognises there are diverse stakeholders, internal and external to Belarus, across and within multiple sectors. OBO will seek to give voice to these stakeholders.

People at Warwick

Professor Elena KorostelevaLink opens in a new windowLink opens in a new window, (co)Founder and (co)Investigator

Dr Anastasiia KudlenkoLink opens in a new windowLink opens in a new window, contributing Researcher

*** In memory of Jonathan Cooper, the founder of Belarus International Committee, Doughty Street Chambers***