Dr Ashima Sood is an Associate Professor and Director of the Centre for Urbanism and Cultural Economics at Anant National University. Her research interest lies at the intersection of institutional economics and urban and development studies. It combines qualitative and quantitative research design to examine privatised forms of urban governance and informal public spaces.

She holds a PhD in Economics from Cornell University, USA. She also earned a Master’s in English (Fiction concentration) and Economics from the University of California-Davis and the Delhi School of Economics, respectively. She was an Urban Studies Foundation International Fellow at the Oxford Department of International Development in 2022. In the winter of 2023, Dr. Sood served as a Visiting Professor at the Institute of Political Economy at Carleton University.

Dr Sood’s research has received recognition, fellowships and grants from international and national funders such as the University of Manchester, Azim Premji University Foundation, the Indian Institute of Advanced Study, Shimla, the Centre de Science Humaines and the India Foundation for the Arts, among others. Her work has been published in scholarly outlets such as Urban Studies, Cities, Territory, Politics and Governance, alongside many others.

She reads and writes fiction, non-fiction and poetry. Over the years, her work has appeared in a variety of publications, including Sarai Reader, The Common, Zubaan’s 21 under 40 (a fiction anthology by young women writers), the Femina magazine (chosen by the poet Imtiaz Dharker), among others. She is also a movie buff and enjoys reading subtitles.