The CSDA’s Prof Leila Patel holds the DST/NRF South African Research Chair in Welfare and Social Development at the University of Johannesburg’s Centre for Social Development in Africa (CSDA). 
Research Chairs are nominated by universities, at the level of Associate Professor
or full Professor, and are benchmarked nationally. The intention of these research
Chairs is to attract and retain established researchers of high calibre, within the
universities, recruiting individuals from within South Africa and globally.
In 2015 UJ was successful in securing a Research Chair in Welfare and Social
Development. Despite the significance of this field of social enquiry in South Africa, there
is limited research capacity to grow the field. Departments of Social Work at
South African universities are required to align undergraduate programmes with
the developmental approach, but this alignment has occurred unevenly. Only a few universities offer postgraduate programmes that are
dedicated to training high level researchers with a specific
focus on social welfare and social development. At most
universities, postgraduate offerings concentrate on specific
categories of client groups or methods of practice.
Social welfare and social development issues are attracting
scholarly interest from other disciplines such as development
studies, economics, political science, sociology, psychology
and in health and education. There is now wide recognition
that complex social development issues (such as poverty
and vulnerability based on age, disability or other social
characteristics, and youth unemployment) require an
interdisciplinary response. A new generation of social
workers and social service professionals and researchers are
needed that have an expansive knowledge base drawn from
a variety of disciplines. High level theoretical training and
research capability are needed to respond effectively to these
challenges.
Given the great need for research capacity in social
development, the Chair contributes to growing a new
generation of social development scholars in South Africa but
also in the Southern Africa region. Prof Patel believes that the
Chair builds on the strengths of the CSDA specifically in
the areas of poverty and vulnerability with a focus on women,
children, youth, people with disabilities; in gender and social
protection; and monitoring and evaluation of developmental
social welfare policies and services.