Introduction TO Development Studies PDF

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INTRODUCTION TO DEVELOPMENT STUDIES (Instructor: Sikandar Tangi)

Course Description and Objectives: The course is intended to be of introductory level which aims to familiarize the students with major trends and important topics in the discourse of development. The course covers a wide range of issues the Developing Countries are confronting with , it has tried to look at those issues on different dimensions and defining them not merely from the perspective of one discipline but from different socio- political and economical dimensions. Organization of the course The module is planned of a period of 14-16 weeks, two sessions in a week each of 2 hours. The students are encouraged and expected to actively participate in the classes. The instructor reserves the right to delete, substitute and add new material during the course. Course Assessment 1. Group or individual presentations with a written research paper of 1500 to 2000 words. (Soft copies of all the assignments and presentations must be emailed to the instructor on the day they are due or before) [20%] 2. Monthlies. [40%] 3. Final/Comprehensive exam. [40%]

NOTE: There will be penalties for any assignments submitted after the deadline or on retake quizzes. It should also be noted that late assignments and retake are acceptable only on the three consecutive days after the original deadline.

CONTENTS 

Meaning and views of Development.

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Theories of Development.

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Poverty and Development.

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The Great Transformation.

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Diversity in pre-capitalist societies

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Colonialism, Capitalism and Development

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The Power of Colonial State o Colonial Strategies of Social Control

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Sustainable Development.

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Environmental degradation and Sustainability.

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Democratization, Good governance and Development.

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Agents of development.

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Is the World Overpopulated?

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Community Development and Empowerment.

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Rural development.

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Informal Economy.

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Economic Problem of Man.

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Gender and Development. o Role of Women in Islam

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International Development.

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A World at War. o The Concept of Jihad in Islam.

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Readings: As the course is interdisciplinary, therefore, there is no single textbook for the course. Some of the books that contain a wide variety of topics have been put in the recommended books‘ list. In addition to referring to books, the students are advised to consult a wide range of newspapers, magazines and e-journals that may be of use to students in preparation for their assignments. The students are highly advised to read newspaper and magazines on daily basis.

Recommended Books:  Allen, T and Thomas, A. (2000). Poverty and Development into the 21st Century. Oxford University Press.  Beer De Frik and Swanepoel, H. (2000). Introduction to Development Studies. Oxford University Press, South Africa.  Potter, B Robert and Desai, V. (2000). The Companion to Development Studies. Oxford University Press Inc. New York.  Rist, G. (2002). The History of Development-from Western Origin to Global Faith. Zed Books London.  Rapley, J. (1997). Understanding Development- Theory and Practice in the Third World. UCL Press Limited, London.

SUGGESTIONS:    

Skim all readings before lecture. Reread after the lecture and participate in class discussion for better understanding. Identify main argument (thesis), importance and main supporting evidence/ logic. Try not to get lost in esoteric details and language.

What is development? "The basic purpose of development is to enlarge people's choices. In principle, these choices can be infinite and can change over time. People often value achievements that 3

do not show up at all, or not immediately, in income or growth figures: greater access to knowledge, better nutrition and health services, more secure livelihoods, security against crime and physical violence, satisfying leisure hours, political and cultural freedoms and sense of participation in community activities. The objective of development is to create an enabling environment for people to enjoy long, healthy and creative lives." Mahbubul Haq ‗Development‘ in its present theoretical shape is a western concept and its origin can be traced back from the colonial era-the imperialist policies of ‗civilizing mission‘ could be the best example. The colonialists had been always given this impression to the colonized people of being uncivilized and backward, and to get them developed or civilized is a kind of burden on the white men-a moral duty of the white men. In colonial definition 'development' had been defined to only infrastructural development (e.g. construction of railway, telegraph etc) and other political and economic policies (e.g. English education, democratization, westernization etc) of the colonizers. Development had become an excellent tool

of fulfilling the

imperialist agenda

of disempowerment and

marginalization, this imperialist agenda was implemented with the help of local collaborators acting as agents of development.

Many scholars believe that ‗development age‘, in the post war era, with its new shape officially started from President Truman‘s four point speech. ‗We must embark on a bold new program for making the benefits of our scientific advances and industrial progress available for the improvement and growth of underdeveloped areas. More than half the people of the world are living in conditions approaching misery. Their food is inadequate. They are victims of disease. Their economic life is primitive and stagnant. Their poverty is a handicap and a threat both to them and to more prosperous areas. For the first time in history, humanity possesses the knowledge and skill to relieve the suffering of these people...the old imperialism-exploitation for foreign profit-has no place in our plans. What we envisage is a program of development based on the concepts of democratic fairdealing‘. From this historical speech it‘s very obvious that America had discarded its isolationist policy and is very eager to replace Great Britain as the new superpower. With its amazingly advanced scientific and technological power America‘s believes that it does possess all the ingredients of an imperialist‘s power. 4

Since 1945, the concept of development is a highly debatable issue. We keep facing different kinds of definitions in different periods of time, we have the colonialist definition of infrastructural development to the capitalist definition of ‗trickle down‘ to the socialists' ‗bottom up‘ approach, also the sturcturalists emphasize on state role to the neo-liberal basic idea of restricting state interference and promotion of free trade. It has been observed for decades that the definitions defined by the powerful west becomes the prevalent definition and the meaning of development is being directed towards that definition. It is something of great concerned that development if wrongly defined can make the world, particularly the third world, more vulnerable and undeveloped.

With the end of cold war, the Third World having some break from the cold war politics of exploitation and double standards, realized to the world particularly to the west, that socio-ecological development is more important than mere economic policies, the western concept of development based on modernization theory was challenged. Those aids given to the third world by the superpowers didn‘t bring real change to the third world. The West was made conscious that development has a subjective side that can not be measured statistically. Development was no more considered an economic development, and per capita GNP is not the only tool of measuring development. New tools of measuring development were discovered e.g. Dr. Mahbubul Haq's Human Development Index (HDI). The concept of infrastructural development tends to be replaced by human centered development. Concepts of freedom, choice, empowerment, participation, realization of human potential, sustainable development, justice and social inclusiveness became the part and parcel of the definition of development.

Due to such developments we come across different definition of development. The report of the south commission, produced under the chairmanship of the former Tanzanian president Julius Nyerere, says ‗a process which enables human beings to realize their potential, build self-confidence, and lead lives of dignity and fulfillment. It is a process which frees people from the fear of want and exploitation. It is a movement away from political, economic, or social oppression. Through development, political independence acquires its true significance. And it is process of growth, a movement

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essentially springing from within the society that is developing‘ (cited in Rist, p.9, 2002). Another definition which is same in its essence to the South Commission is given by UNDP ‗The Human Development Report of 1991, published by the United Nation Development Program, state: ‗the basic objective of human development is to enlarge the range of people‘s choices to make development more democratic and participatory. These choices should include access to income and employment opportunities, education and health, and a clean and safe physical environment. Each individual should also have the opportunity to participate fully in community decisions and to enjoy human, economic and political freedoms. From the past history of development it can be said that the West is pretending itself as a role model for the Third World Countries and giving this impression that the Third World has to follow in the footsteps of those of the North to make a success of their own future. Modernization is being tried to synonymize with westernization. Swanepoel (2004) has pointed out three important items against the archetype ethnocentric definition of development, that are: first it had to be 'human oriented', second local participation should be must and thirdly all development projects have to be based on sustainable development notion. This recent definition emphasizes the human factor of development; participation has become the norm of development. Lack of participation will disempower the stakeholders and consequently they won‘t enjoy the ownership of development. It is greatly expected that sideling the locals from participation can also cause the destruction of local values and local ecology, so consequently any development without local participation can not bring positive results and that kind of development could be mere waste of time and scarce development resources.

Another very simple definition of ‗Development‘ defined by Chambers (1997) is 'good change', it is very difficult of achieving ‗good change‘ without destroying something previously held dear such as traditional values. Again it is very important to know that development is not a one-off process of change, it‘s a multifaceted phenomenon, and it implies an all encompassing change not just an improvement in one aspect. it is to be noted that respect for local values, traditions , religion, spirituality, aesthetics and agrarian virtues become more important in case of traditional societies like Afghanistan.

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Bibliography  Chambers, R. (1997) Whose Reality Counts? Putting the First Last, Intermediate Technology Publications, London.  Rist, Gilbert (2002) The History of Development: From Western Origins to Global Faith. Zed Books Ltd. New York.  Swanepoel, Hennie and De Beer, Frik (2004) Introduction to Development Studies. Oxford University Press, Southern Africa.  Cramer, Christopher and Jonathan Goodhand (2002) Try Again. Fail Again. Fail Better? War, the State and the Post-Conflict Challenge in Afghanistan. Development and Change. Vol. 30, pp. 885-909  Knight, Mark and Ozerdem Alpaslan (2004) Disarmament and Demobilization of former Combatants during the war to peace transition, guns, camps and cash? Journal of Peace Research 41:4, pp. 499-516.

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Development and Conflict Theory By Olympio Barbanti, Jr. August 2004 The concept of "development" cuts across many levels. It refers to macro issues (such as patterns of a nation's growth), as much as it refers to meso problems (such as river-basin plans), or to micro problems (such as local community development). All three levels — macro, meso, and micro, are interwoven. And at all levels, many different dimensions — economic, cultural, religious and gender — affect and are affected by development. This research addresses the links between the promotion of social change associated with development aid and conflict. Development should be understood as a process, not a product. Societies are always changing. Some improve, while others fail. Development theory aims at explaining both processes. Development practice intends to provide tools that can be applied to entire societies or specific communities. Such interventions are intended to move communities or societies from a situation in which they are believed to be worse off to a situation in which they are assumed to be better off. Current links between development and conflict theory stress the provision of aid in cases of violent conflict. Peacebuilding interventions after violent conflicts address the same concerns as development interventions. Clearly, development is at the core of postconflict interventions, where the physical and social landscape has been damaged. In such cases, development assistance is provided. Yet development aid goes beyond development assistance. Aid refers to general support for the improvement of Third World societies, which may or may not be, in violent conflict. Perhaps because development aid does not deal directly with violence, conflict and conflict resolution have not been topics of major concern to development theorists or workers. This, however, has started to change. The Millennium Development Goals illustrate how development is an interdisciplinary field, which implements programs in various areas and deals with innumerable variables — such as economic, social, political, gender, cultural, religious and environmental issues. The field is further complicated because these variables are highly intertwined. Therefore, the analysis of gender issues must also consider the affects of and on linked economic, religious, and cultural issues. Similar links exist with many other development topics. Such links become clear in the findings of this research.

Development and Structural Change Societal change most often requires structural change. While this may be true in any country, it is probably more often true in the developing world. Yet most development

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intervention is locally targeted and short-term. It does not try to implement structural change across the entire society. This disconnect creates something of a "Catch-22" — a vicious cycle in which development leads to conflict, and the lack of conflict resolution practices interferes with further development. Ignoring structural factors means not only overlooking dimensions that take place at the macro level, but also not paying enough attention to the micro-level effects of development and conflict in society. One shocking example was recently publicized by an opinion poll, according to which 67% of Brazilians are functionally illiterate. That means they have great difficulty in understanding very basic information. How can one promote rational processes of conflict resolution in this situation? Such functional illiteracy is caused, in part, by the fragility of the educational system. Deteriorated schools mirror the economic crisis of developing countries as well as the lack of importance attributed to education by the society. This is largely a result of longstanding social inequities maintained by an elite that benefits from the resulting patronclient relationship. These relationships are so strong that the structural problems continue, even after some conflict resolution measures are taken, such as the empowerment of powerless groups.

Development and Conflict The interconnection of development factors often causes further conflict escalation. For example, administrative chaos in under-financed governmental bodies often causes the transference of responsibilities from the central state to NGOs, local governments, and the private sector. The result is that such organizations assume duties that may go well beyond their capacities, which causes further conflict. For example, NGOs, local governments, and the private sector lack training in facilitation, mediation, and negotiation, as well as the theoretical knowledge of conflict resolution. So conflicts escalate, with no one knowing what to do about it. There are few institutions in most developing societies that understand or engage in the practice of conflict resolution. But even when they do, they tend to work with inadequate win-win frameworks. In some cases, for example, negotiation through typical win-win processes is blocked because the powerful within poor communities are criminals. In Brazil, criminal elements are able to exert full control over large territories, mostly within metropolitan areas, from where they traffic in narcotics and weapons. This is one of many reasons why traditional interest-based, win-win negotiation does not work in many cases in developing countries. In Brazil, the criminal sector has been able to recruit children as young as nine years old. The profile of the typical youth taken to reform schools is shocking. The majority are around 13 years old, yet they are fathers and breadwinners. Most often, they turned to crime because they do not have other employment options nor do they have an expectation of a better life. Due to the economic crisis of the last ten years, permanent and secure employment was largely replaced by "flexible," insecure contracts without the

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guarantees of the official social security system. This has particularly affected women and other vulnerable groups in society, who form the majority of those working in the informal sector. This informality has brought further constraints to conflict resolution in developing countries. Many young people are already the second, or even the third generation of families who are mainly employed in "flexible," or "odd" jobs. They lack the culture of work, and the values attributed to it. Social values are also often undermined by the official educational system, since information disseminated by books in public schools is embedded with prejudice and stereotypes that, for example, overvalue men in detriment of women. Development aid tries to change such problems. These factors, among others, are the target of the Millennium Goals. However, in many instances, development interventions underestimate local politics, social realities, and belief systems. These are strong factors affecting the opportunities for conflict resolution, which nevertheless have remained overlooked by those working in the field of development theory and practice. It is remarkable that conflict resolution theory and instruments are also not taken into account either by indigenous organizations, or by international development agencies. This is clearly evidenced by the Human Development Report 2003, published by the United Nations Development Program (UNDP). The report reflects a deep concern with armed, violent and military conflicts such as interstate or civil wars. However, it does not consider other more subtle forms of conflict, or the notion that conflict processes can preclude the achievement of development goals. An understanding of the nature and effects of international development illustrate...