The Research Team
Professor Lena Rethel
Principal Investigator
Lena Rethel is a Professor of International Political Economy in the Department of Politics and International Studies at the University of Warwick, UK. Her research focuses on the intersection of finance and development.
Lena’s recent books are The International Political Economy of Everyday Life (co-authored, Oxford University Press, 2022) and The Political Economy of Financial Development in Malaysia (Routledge, 2021).
Lena has previously held positions as a Fung Global Fellow at Princeton University (2016-2017) and as a Visiting Fellow at the Oxford Centre for Islamic Studies (2017-2018).
Dr Resya Kania
Research Fellow
Dr. Resya Kania is a Research Fellow in the Department of Politics and International Studies at the University of Warwick. Her research explores how financial systems intersect with social policy, with a particular focus on policymaking processes and coalitions. Her doctoral research examined the global and national coalitions that shape financial inclusion policies, with a case study on Indonesia.
Before joining Warwick, Resya worked as a researcher at the Solicitors Regulation Authority in the UK. She has also held senior policy roles, including Director for Policy (Southeast Asia) at Women’s World Banking and Deputy Director for Financial Services and State-Owned Enterprises at Indonesia’s National Development Planning Agency.
With over 15 years of experience in research and policymaking, Resya has worked across a range of issues including financial inclusion, consumer vulnerability, financial literacy, and women's economic empowerment. A consistent thread in her work is a commitment to understanding how coalitions improve policy outcomes for marginalised groups.
Dr Florence Dafe
Senior Researcher
Florence Dafe is a senior researcher in the FINDEM project, Department of Politics and International Studies at the University of Warwick. Her research interests revolve around finance and development, especially the domestic and external political constraints that governments in the Global South face in governing their financial sectors.
Florence also lectures at TUM School of Politics and Technology at the Technical University of Munich (TUM). Prior to joining TUM, she was a Fellow in International Political Economy at the Department of International Relations at the London School of Economics and Political Science (LSE) and lecturer in International Political Economy at City, University of London. She is also an associate researcher at the German Institute of Development and Sustainability (IDOS).
Dr Kofi Gunu
Research Fellow
Kofi Gunu is a Research Fellow in the Department of Politics and International Studies at the University of Warwick. His research examines the connections between national policymaking, international organizations, and global finance, with a regional focus on sub-Saharan Africa. He is currently writing a book on how crisis-stricken governments successfully resist pressure to seek IMF bailouts.
Prior to joining Warwick, Kofi was a Postdoctoral Research Fellow at the Boston University Global Development Policy Center. He has also held policy roles with the Office of the Vice President of Ghana, the United States Senate, and the Council on Foreign Relations.
He received a DPhil and MPhil in International Relations from the University of Oxford, where he was a Rhodes Scholar, and a master’s degree in Global Affairs from Tsinghua University in Beijing.