Tsitsi Mpofu-Mketwa

Assistant Professor, Chair of the CSPSC

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Dr. Tsitsi Mpofu-Mketwa joined the Centre for Studies on Poverty and Social Citizenship in 2024, bringing over 15 years of experience in the academic and non-profit sectors. She advanced poverty and social development work in the Cape Flats communities of Cape Town, focusing on child protection social work, youth development, and women’s empowerment. Her research prioritizes applied, community-engaged, and participatory approaches that use human development paradigms to build the capacities of marginalized and most deprived communities in response to urban poverty and social exclusion. Through this work, she promotes sustainable livelihoods in poverty contexts and examines how resilience, along with individual and collective agency, contributes to social and human development.

Tsitsi has taught sociology and social work courses on poverty, development, and community development at both undergraduate and graduate levels. She actively advocates for environmental sustainability, tackling invasive species to promote green spaces as part of green social work through the Greenspace Stewardship Committee of the Alta Vista Community Association in Ottawa. She earned a PhD in Sociology of Development and an MSoc Sci in Social Development from the University of Cape Town.