Mission Statement

The Orfalea Center for Global & International Studies works to build a supportive infrastructure for research collaboration and delivery by cultivating spaces for collaborative research among UCSB faculty, graduate students, and research partners and publicly engaged organizations in the global south/east.   This commitment to research – among Area Studies specialists, students and faculty clustered in thematic groups, and geographic-based research hubs for participatory research in the global south/east – ensures that the Orfalea Center is engaged with the most urgent issues of the day, and has the capacity to create real impact and change. We label this mission “Research for Action.”

We approach our mission by recognizing distinct types of knowledge and seeking mutual benefits from collaboration across these differences. Currently, the Center has established several geographic research hubs (Ecuador, Brazil, India, Mexico, Angola, Egypt) and hosts eight different thematic research clusters: (1) Global Genders and Sexualities; (2) Structural Violence, Police/Prison Abolition, and Decoloniality; (3) Resistance, Autonomy, Liberation; (4) Social Data and the Archive; (5) Future Infrastructures: Water, Energy and Justice; (6) Transnationalizing the Study of the United States; (7) Global Futures: Uncertainty, Displacement, Security; (8) Environmental Justice/Climate Justice. The members of each cluster work to create and curate educational materials for other scholars, activists, educators, interested publics to utilize in their own work. For more information about each thematic cluster, including access to their curated resources visit the Orfalea Center Research Cluster webpage.

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