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183 pages

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Over the past fifteen years, ideas in the field of development studies have been highly contested. During this time, most countries from the South have come under the iron heel of the IMF and World Bank, who have imposed structural adjustment programmes wherever they have provided loan capital to governments. However, these programmes have had little success, and development studies has suffered accordingly.

Many development theorists turned to postmodernist theory to try to move on from this impasse, which in the 1990s led to a new line of critical thought that heralded 'the end of development'. They argued that development studies should be replaced by new strategies of emancipation, or 'new social movements' theory, originating in groups such as the Zapatistas of Mexico.

This book summarises the contested ideas of development studies and new social movements theory while rejecting calls for the end of development. Using postmodern theory to demonstrate that forms of development can be complementary to emancipatory social movement projects, Trevor Parfitt develops an alternative model of development which incorporates the needs of peoples both South and North.
1. Introduction

2. From Post-Modernity to Post-Development

2.1. Introduction

2.2. From Modernity to Post-Modernity

2.3. Post-Development and its Discontents

2.4. Conclusions

3. Discourse of Power or Truth?

3.1. Introduction

3.2. Archaeologies and Genealogies

3.3. Discourse Ethics and the Problems of Application

4. Towards a Development of Least Violence?

4.1. Introduction

4.2. Deconstruction at First Sight

4.3. Ethics as First Philosophy

4.4. A Philosophy of the Least Violence

4.5. Undecidability and the Decision

4.6. Deconstruction, Politics, Development

4.7. Conclusions

5. New Social Movements: A Subject of Development?

5.1. Introduction

5.2. Social Movements and Permanent Revolution

5.3. An Islamic Politics of Least Violence?

5.4. Conclusions

6. Aid and the Principle of Least Violence

6.1. Introduction

6.2. Participation as a Development of Least Violence

6.3. Conclusions

7. Conclusion

Notes

Index

Sujets

Development studies

Science

Informations

Publié par	Pluto Press
Date de parution	20 mars 2002
Nombre de lectures	0
EAN13	9781849640916
Langue	English

Informations légales : prix de location à la page 0,6250€. Cette information est donnée uniquement à titre indicatif conformément à la législation en vigueur.

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The End of Development?

Modernity, Post-Modernity and Development

Trevor Parfitt

P Pluto Press LONDON • STERLING, VIRGINIA

First published 2002 by Pluto Press 345 Archway Road, London N6 5AA and 22883 Quicksilver Drive, Sterling, VA 20166–2012, USA

www.plutobooks.com

The right of Trevor Parfitt to be identified as the author of this work has been asserted by him in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.

ISBN 0 7453 1638 7 hardback ISBN 0 7453 1637 9 paperback

British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library

Library of Congress Cataloging in Publication Data Parfitt, Trevor W., 1954– The end of development? : modernity, post-modernity and development / Trevor Parfitt. p. cm. ISBN 0–7453–1638–7 1. Development economics. I. Title. HD75 .P376 2002 306.3—dc21 2001005311

Designed and produced for Pluto Press by Chase Publishing Services, Fortescue, Sidmouth EX10 9QG Typeset from disk by Stanford DTP Services, Towcester Printed in the European Union by Antony Rowe, Chippenham, England

IN MEMORIAM

Anthony Ivers (1946–96) Stephen Riley (1949–99)

Friends and peers who instinctively understood about being for the other

Contents

Acknowledgements

Introduction: The End of Development?

From Post-Modernity to Post-Development 2.1 Introduction 2.2 From Modernity to Post-Modernity 2.3 Post-Development and its Discontents 2.4 Conclusions

Discourse of Power or Truth? 3.1 Introduction 3.2 Archeologies and Genealogies 3.3 Discourse Ethics and the Problems of Application

Towards a Development of Least Violence? 4.1 Introduction 4.2 Deconstruction at First Sight 4.3 Ethics as First Philosophy 4.4 A Philosophy of the Least Violence 4.5 Undecidability and the Decision 4.6 Deconstruction, Politics, Development 4.7 Conclusions

New Social Movements: A Subject of Development? 5.1 Introduction 5.2 Social Movements and Permanent Revolution 5.3 An Islamic Politics of Least Violence? 5.4 Conclusions

Aid and the Principle of Least Violence 6.1 Introduction 6.2 Participation as a Development of Least Violence 6.3 Conclusions

Conclusion

Bibliography Index

12 12 13 28 43

45 45 46 59

74 74 76 80 89 95 106 114

117 117 124 132 140

142 142 146 158

160

165 171

Acknowledgements

In undertaking this project I have accumulated numerous debts to those who have helpedandsupportedme in various ways. Thanks are due to the American University in Cairo, which supported my research with time off andfinancial assistance. Many of my colleagues at AUC were helpful. Dr Dan Tschirgi andDr Tony Lang were encouraging about early drafts of my manuscript, whilst Dr Kate McInturff, andDr Mark Salter made useful suggestions about later drafts. Josh Stacher was of great help in researching material concerning Islamism. I am also grateful to Ray Bush who encouragedme at every stage of this project. Both Ray andPandeli Glavanis took time to readvarious drafts andmake useful comments for which I thank them. I am particularly grateful to Ms Pamela Ritchie for her dedication and skill in preparing my manuscript for the publisher. My thanks to all the staff at Pluto Press who have helpedme throughout this project. Last, but not least, I thank my sister Patricia who afforded me hospitality at various points in the production of this book. Needless to say, any shortcomings or errors are my responsibility alone.

Introduction: The End of Development?

Towards the end of the 1980s a crisis emerged in development theory. Initially, this was referred to as the ‘impasse’. Most of the tra-ditional theories that were used to examine and delineate development were regarded as having fallen into doubt (e.g. mod-ernisation theory, the various forms of underdevelopment theory and more recently neo-liberalism). Leftist strategies of development were at least partially, if not wholly discredited by the collapse of communism, whilst theories that advocated a development path based on the Western capitalist model were also seen as having delivered few if any of the benefits that they had seemed to promise. Many parts of the ‘Third World’ had been struggling under the weight of accumulated debts to the industrialised countries for more than a decade, while also attempting to apply the market-influenced Structural Adjustment Programmes that had been forced on them by the West, in particular the Washington institutions, the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund (IMF). Structural adjustment was supposed to create the conditions for economic growth in the Third World by removing obstacles to the efficient operation of the free market. By the end of the 1980s (indeed up to the present day) there was (and still is) little evidence that the ubiquitous Structural Adjustment Programmes (SAPs) had stimulated any growth, or created conditions conducive to growth. Under these circumstances it was hardly surprising that many of those involved in development began to feel that the old theories had failed (a notable exception included those practitioners and academics who were associated with the Washington, and other aid institutions, that had made a considerable intellectual and financial investment in such strategies as SAPs). The question was where to go from that position. Such was the nature of the ‘impasse’. In the absence of any trustworthy theoretical grounding many theorists have sought a path through the impasse by reference to the body of theory variously known as ‘post-modernism’, or poststruc-turalism. Post-modernism is associated with a wide body of theory

The End of Development?

by analysts as various as Jean Baudrillard, Jean Francois Lyotard, Emmanuel Levinas, Michel Foucault, Jacques Derrida, and Fredric Jameson. Although post-modernism is notoriously difficult to define, it is possible to point to certain themes, or tendencies, that are associated with this type of thinking (post-modernity is too diffuse to refer to it as a school of thought). In particular, post-modernists tend to take a critical position with regard to the habits of thought associated with modernity (although, as we shall see, some of them are more sympathetic than others to the body of ideas that is usually associated with modernity). Aspects of modern thinking that are often subjected to post-modern critique include the belief that history incorporates a teleology of progress, that if one examines human history one can detect a process of progress towards greater levels of civilisation, or towards human emancipa-tion. Classical Marxist theory would represent one example of such a teleological theory, in that human society is seen as progressing from one socio-economic stage of development to another more advanced one, the culmination of this process being achieved with the establishment of communism, the most advanced form of society, and the goal of history. Post-modern theorists would deny that such a dynamic of progress is built into history, and would reject the possibility that there could be such a thing as the goal of history. History is viewed simply as a contingent succession of events. Post-modernists would also tend to criticise what is often viewed as a peculiarly modernist faith in the ability of humankind to improve their conditions through science, broadly conceived as the ability to mould and shape their world through the application of technology and such methods as rational techniques of planning. This is not to say that post-modernists argue that technology and planning never result in the desired, or at least beneficial outcomes, although some come quite close to such a position at times (e.g. Paul Feyerabend on science). However, they are usually suspicious of the ability of planners and social engineers to achieve their supposedly benign objectives for society (and this is to leave aside the possibil-ity that they may express such benign objectives as a cover for less generally beneficial aims). The above does not amount to anything like a full definition of post-modernism. However, it does indicate that certain problems arise out of post-modernism for the related concepts of development and aid. After all, most, if not all of the traditional development theories, whether of the left or the right, took the form of teleolog-

Introduction: The End of Development?

ical theories that envisaged development in terms of achievement of some sort of societal end goal, such as communism in the case of the former group, or capitalism in the case of the latter. Post-modernists would not only dismiss leftist theorists who saw history as a progress towards communism, but also pro-capitalist theories, such as that of Rostow, who argued that all societies progressed through five stages of development, culminating in the achievement of high mass consumerism on the American model. It also follows from the above observations that post-modernists would be critical of the whole enterprise of development planning, both at the macro-level of national and regional planning, and at the micro-level of designing specific project interventions, such as an agricultural, health or educational project. Indeed, there are plenty of examples of development plans and projects that misfire for a variety of reasons, including poor design, failure to anticipate operational or other problems, bureaucratic inefficiency or lack of capacity and so forth. Given the plenitude of such evidence and the post-modern suspicion of teleology and planning, it is hardly surprising that the theorists who took a post-modern route out of the impasse often ended by taking a rejectionist position towards development. One of the first examples of this post-development line of thinking wasThe Development Dictionaryesidot,r1n99.2tIisbldihepu, Wolfgang Sachs debunked development in the following terms:

The idea of development stands like a ruin in the intellectual landscape. Delusion and disappointment, failures and crimes have been the steady companions of development and they tell a common story: it did not work. Moreover, the historical conditions which catapulted the idea into prominence have vanished: development has become outdated. But above all, the hopes and desires that made the idea fly, are now exhausted: development has grown obsolete. (Sachs, 1992: 1)

In the same volume, Gustavo Esteva provides a powerful critique of the word‘development’ examining its origins as a Western concept andthe way in which it has been usedby imperial powers of various stripes as a support for their own ideological projects of domination. He also notes the changing content of the word, as it hasmovedfromednotinganessentiallyeconomicprocessof growth to take on other connotations such as participation and human-centreddevelopment (Esteva, in Sachs, 1992: 6–25). Sachs

The End of Development?

comments that ‘development has become an amoeba-like concept, shapeless but ineradicable’, with ‘contours so blurred it denotes nothing ...’ (Sachs, 1992: 4). This renders it eminently clear that as far as the authors are concerned the whole enterprise of development should be abandoned as having done far more harm than good. Over the next few yearsThe Development Dictionarywas joined by a number of other volumes that variously used elements of post-modern theory to critique, and often to reject the idea of development. Arturo Escobar used critical techniques associated with Michel Foucault to analyse and dismiss development as a discourse inEncountering Development: The Making and Unmaking of the Third Worldpublished in 1995. Discourse may be defined as referring to bodies of ideas and concepts, or theory, which mediate power through their effects upon the way we act (this is a rather simplistic definition, but discourse will be dealt with in greater detail in future chapters). The same year saw the publication of the reader edited by Jonathan Crush,Power of Development, which gathered together a number of articles (including an excerpt from Escobar’s book) that took a similar approach to the analysis of development. M.P. Cowen and R.W. Shenton also used techniques influenced by Foucault to trace the history of develop-ment as an idea inDoctrines of Development(1996), although they take a more nuanced approach of criticising what they see as the negative and repressive content of the concept of development in the hope of liberating it for a more progressive and emancipatory reading. Majid Rahnema and Victoria Bawtree editedThe Post-Devel-opment Reader(1997), in which they gathered a variety of readings that were critical of aspects of development. In his afterword Rahnema used elements of Foucauldian thought together with aspects of Ghandian and Confucian thinking to argue for the rejection of development. Esteva, together with Madhu Suri Prakash, producedGrassroots Post-Modernism: Remaking the Soil of Cultures (1998), which argued once again that development had done more harm than good, and that emancipation of the world’s social majorities (so-called because the majority of the world’s population are those living at the grass roots in the Third World, although there are concentrations of the poor in the North) is best left to movements originating with those social majorities (a position similar to that put by Escobar). Numerous periodical articles and other publications could be cited that take a similar line. It would seem that we have a new ‘post-development’ school of thought, or