Dr. Phillan Zamchiya officially joined the Institute for Poverty, Land and Agrarian Studies (PLAAS) as a senior researcher in 2017. He holds a Doctor of Philosophy (DPhil) in International Development from the University of Oxford. His academic interests are twofold. He studies contemporary trajectories of land and agrarian change in Southern Africa and the politics of post-colonial states in democratic transitions. He is currently the regional coordinator of PLAAS’s new project on the privatisation of customary land and women’s land rights in Zimbabwe, Mozambique, South Africa and Zambia.