Position: Fellow, Critical Minerals Policy Lab

Education: PhD in Latin American Studies — University of Liverpool (ESRC-funded)

Joanna Morley is a fellow of the Critical Minerals Policy Lab and a PhD graduate in Latin American Studies from the University of Liverpool, funded by the Economic and Social Research Council (ESRC).

Her research covers three interconnected areas:

1. Political Economy of Energy Transitions She examines the challenges and consequences of large-scale energy infrastructure projects at both national and local scales, connecting these projects to broader international development agendas.

2. Contested Natural Resource Governance Her work investigates how communities respond to extraction projects, the distributional impacts of resource development, and the role of civil society in shaping more just and sustainable outcomes.

3. Socio-Environmental Politics She focuses particularly on extractive industries, analysing environmental justice movements, mining conflicts, and the intersection of global policy frameworks with on-the-ground realities.

Her regional expertise centres on Latin America , where she has conducted extensive fieldwork on mining conflicts, energy policy, and environmental justice movements.