Knowledge, Technology and Society team blog: New special issue: Global land governance

Knowledge, Technology and Society team blog: New special issue: Global land governance: A special issue of the journal Development and Change , entitled Governing Global Land Deals: The Role of the State in the Rush for Land ,...

Critique of the Critique: Post-Development and points of criticism

This piece on post-development is taken from http://www.globalpolitics.cz/clanky/critique-of-the-critique-post-development-and-points-of-criticism by Christiane Löper, a political science student at the University of Vienna. For complete version please click the above link.

 

2.2 Post-Development or the Postmodernisation of Development

Sven Engel calls post-development „Die Postmodernisierung der Entwicklungsthe­orie“² (Engel 2001: 63). To put Post-Development into a wider context concerning its philosophical and academic roots, I believe it is relevant to explain what postmodernism means. This explanation will be relevant to answer the criticism formulated on post-development in chapter 3 as well as to reflect on my own encounter with post-modernity and post-development.

Postmodernism can be seen as a critique of the modern age[italics mine], based on the philosophical tradition which is based on the Enlightenment, the formation of a bourgeoisie and of a global capitalistic system.

The tradition of modern science, which is based on the believe in positivism and in objectivism says: the world consists of facts, which present the truth. As a critique of this claim of knowing and producing truth, and as a critique of the one big theory that leads to unification and continuities instead of dealing with discontinuities, contradictions and change, central to postmoderism is the respect of diversity, and the enhancement of subjective perceptions (Novy 2002: 22f).

According to Sven Engel, postmodernism can be understood a) as epistemological position and b) as a socio-cultural position. The first is a philosophical deconstruction of structuralism, known as poststructuralism (Foucault, Derrida, Deleuze): „Modern thinking is superseded by the heterogeneity and fragmentation of postmodern thinking, which emphasizes different perspectives and differentiations and which questions rationality as a means to understanding“³ (Engel 2001: 50). Concerning the academic debate, Sven Engel refers to Post-Development as the „postmodernisation of development critique“ (Engel 2001: 65).

As we can see in chapter 3, the points of criticism formulated about Post-Development theory parallel with a critique towards postmodern thought in general. To look at Post-Development theory as one part of postmodern thought helps to understand its intentions and its background.[...]

Eco-nomics: Are the Planet-Unfriendly Features of Capitalism Barriers to Sustainability? - Merrill Singer

Abstract: This paper argues that there are essential features of capitalist modes of production, consumption, and waste dispersal in interaction with the environment and its built-in systemic features that contradict long-term sustainable development. These features include: (a) contradictions in the origin and meaning of sustainability; (b) the central role of the productivity ethic in capitalism and its reproduction in emergent green capitalism; (c) the commodification of nature and the continued promotion of expanding consumption; (d) globalism and the contradictions of continued Western-style development; and (e) the emergence of anthropogenic ecocrises and crises interaction. In light of these barriers to capitalist sustainability, an alternative social narrative is needed, one that embraces values, understandings, and relationships that promote ecological stability and justice.

Post-Devt Thinker: Gustavo Esteva

'...in 1976 he stated “Even the best development programs, like those I was conceiving and implementing, were totally counterproductive: damaging to their supposed beneficiaries” (Esteva 2004).'

Gustavo Esteva

Life

According to Wikipedia, Gustavo Esteva was born in Mexico City on August 20, 1936. The following was compiled from a presentation given by Gustavo Esteva in 2004 titled: Schooling and Education: A Symposium with Friends of Ivan Illich; and Gustavo Teran’s presentation of Gustavo Esteva’s own account of his turning points or “rupturas” from 2002. All taken from the online accounts.

Gustavo Esteva grew up middle class in Mexico City with his Creole father and mother. As his parents embraced the new Westernized Mexico, Gustavo experienced at a young age the pulling away and subsequent discrimination of their indigenous family background. This included his Zapotec (Indian) grandmother from Oaxaca, Mexico, with whom he seems to always looked back with longing to the traditions his family left behind when then became Westernized. In his middle class home, it was believed that education and development would change the status of the family for the better.  However, Gustavo discovered that in embracing what the present and future can give you, one can lose, even despise the traditions of one’s past.

Gustavo was educated in a Catholic school and desperately sought for the proof of the existence of God.  He became disillusioned at about 13 years old when he felt the priest and philosopher he was studying under, Father José Sánchez Villaseñor, seemed to only believe in the idea of God, but not the true existence of God.  After a conversation and this revelation, Gustavo discovered he no longer believed in God. It was then that he replaced religion with reason.  From that he felt that reason (and ultimately science) gave him the true way to see the world. 

Gustavo looked briefly at other Eastern religions and also found them empty.  During this time, around the age of 15, Gustavo’s father died. During this time Gustavo was still searching and began reading philosophical texts and it that found one he really liked by Marx and Engels titled, “German Ideology.” Along the way he also found a father figure in his college professor Alfonso Zahar. Zahar, influenced his decision to study administration and even helped Gustavo land his first job in the Bank of Commerce.  Gustavo went on to become the youngest executive for the company IBM. From 1970 to 1976 Esteva served as a high-ranking official in the government under President  Echeverria. 

When he left this job in 1976 he stated “Even the best development programs, like those I was conceiving and implementing, were totally counterproductive: damaging to their supposed beneficiaries” (Esteva 2004).  He wanted to instead work in the area of civil society, establishing effective nonprofit organizations, which is what he has been working on to this day. He is very well known for his work as an advocate for Post-Development.  Some of his main accomplishments have been working as an advisor with the Zapatista Army for National Liberation in Chiapas, working at the Centre for Intercultural Dialogues and Exchanges in Oaxaca, working with Indian groups, and working as a journalist. One of his greatest accomplishments was establishing a university in Oaxaca, Universidad de la Tierra.

Books

• David Barkin, Gustavo Esteva: Inflación y Democracia : El Caso de México, México : Siglo XXI, 1979
• Gustavo Esteva: Economía y enajenación [Economy and alienation], México, D.F. : Biblioteca Universidad Veracruzana, 1980
• Gustavo Esteva: La batalla en el México rural, México : Siglo XXI, 1982.
• James E. Austin and Gustavo Esteva (ed.):Food policy en Mexico : the search for selfsufficiency, Ithaca ; London : Cornell Univ. Pr., 1987
• Gustavo Esteva: Fiesta - jenseits von Entwicklung, Hilfe und Politik, Frankfurt a. M. : Brandes & Apsel, 1992 -German translation of a selection of essays, enlarged second edition in 1995
• Gustavo Esteva: Crónica del fin de una era : el secreto del EZLN, México : Ed. Posada, 1994
• Gustavo Esteva Figueroa and Madhu Suri Prakash: Hope at the margins : beyond human rights and development, New York : St. Martin’s Press, 1997
• Madhu Suri Prakash and Gustavo Esteva: Escaping education : living as learning within grassroots cultures, New York [etc.]: Peter Lang, 1998
• Gustavo Esteva and Madhu Suri Prakash: Grassroots post-modernism : remaking the soil of cultures, London & New Jersey: Zed Books, 1998
• Gustavo Esteva, and Catherine Marielle (eds.):Sin maíz no hay país: páginas de una exposición, México : Consejo Nacional para la Cultura y las Artes, Dirección General de Culturas Populares e Indígenas, 2003

Articles

• Esteva, Gustavo: "Regenerating People's space" in: Saul H. Mendlovitz and R.B.J. Walker, Towards a Just World Peace. London: Butterworths, 1987; pp. 271–298.
• Esteva, Gustavo: "Tepito: No Thanks, First World", in: In Context, num. 30, Fall/Winter 1991
• Esteva, Gustavo: "Development" in The Development Dictionary. A Guide to Knowledge as Power, London & New Jersey: Zed Books, 1992, pp. 6–25
• Esteva, Gustavo: "Re-embedding Food in Agriculture", in: Culture and Agriculture [Virginia, USA], 48, Winter 1994
• Esteva, Gustavo: "From 'Global Thinking' to 'Local Thinking': Reasons to Go beyond Globalization towards Localization", with M.S.Prakash, in: Osterreichische Zeitschirift für Politikwissenschatft, 2, 1995
• Esteva, Gustavo:"Hosting the Otherness of the Green Revolution" in: Frédérique Apffel-Marglin and Stephen A. Marglin, eds.: Decolonizing Knowledge: From Development to Dialogue. Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1996, pp. 249–278
• Esteva, Gustavo: "Beyond Development, What?", with M.S. Prakash, in: Development in Practice, Vol. 8, No.3, Aug 1998.
• Esteva, Gustavo: "The Zapatistas and People's Power", in Capital & Class, 68, Summer 1999.
• Esteva, Gustavo: "The meaning and scope of the struggle for autonomy" in: Lat. Am. Perspect., 28:2, March 2001, pp. 120–148
• Esteva, Gustavo(2004a): "Back from the future" -Notes for the presentation in “Schooling and Education: A Symposium with Friends of Ivan Illich” organized by TALC New Vision, Milwaukee, October 9, 2004. online
• Esteva, Gustavo(2004b):“Rupturas:” Turning Points online
• Esteva, Gustavo: The Oaxaca commune and Mexico's autonomous movement's, Oaxaca de Juárez, Oaxaca, México : Ed. ¡Basta!, 2008, 22 p.

Reposted with gratitude by IFP - [original] Posted by Gustavo Esteva

Time-lapse history of human global CO2 emissions

Development Management: Can the ‘new aid paradigm’ and its associated values and principles really make a difference to global poverty? (by Ivan Fukuoka)

Introduction

Globalisation of a singular-development model will inevitably invite challenges and resistance especially when the resulting benefit is not redistributed and shared with those marginalised by the development process. Poverty and hunger are indicators of a dysfunctional development approach of our modern and increasingly globalised world.

The nineties was a decade of many economic and financial challenges but also host to many important international conferences and meetings concerning the state of the world. Many of these conferences were fundamental in the setting of a common vision for a better world. One of such conference was the United Nations (UN) Millennium Summit in September 2000, which produced a declaration and adopted by 189 UN member-nations. The UN ‘Millennium Declaration’ contained ‘a commitment to work towards environmentally sustainable human development’.

Thereafter, the ‘Millennium Declaration’ evolved into a set of eight-point non-binding framework for development goals aptly called the ‘Millennium Development Goals’ or MDGs. MDGs seek to halve by the year 2015 the problems affecting many developing countries in the South, but not limited to developing countries exclusively.

The first goal of MDGs is eradication of poverty and hunger. This is important because success in poverty reduction is going to influence positively on the remaining goals. But, this will depend on the success level of the ‘new’ aid and development management.

Past failure of structural adjustment programs (SAPs) administered by the IMF and World Bank in many countries during the nineties prompted reformation process at both institutions. The neoliberal economic and development approaches to aid assistance were reformed to be more humane following the UN ‘model’ of human development.

And recent report from aid operation in Afghanistan exposed some weak points from the ‘new aid paradigm’.

The report showed many cases of aid ineffectiveness in delivery of the program and attracts international attention. Putting the validity of the ‘new aid paradigm’ in question.

What needs to be underlined here is that both ‘old’ and ‘new’ paradigm originated from the thinking of ‘economic rationalism’ the values and principles of which are also embedded in current neoliberalism policies. So it’s worth remembering that regardless the number of ‘reformation’ the WB and IMF have taken, their core values and principles remained the same, therefore will not result in any real change or transformation.

Can the ‘new aid paradigm’ constitute a real [development] paradigm shift?

Development process is never a value free exercise because there are many stakeholders with differing interest and motivation from grassroots level up to influential political elites. All these groups have some degree of interest in the development process and its outcome, as it may affect their progress or wellbeing, especially if their economic wellbeing is at stake. In the case of ‘new aid paradigm’ (NAP), the principal stakeholders are forces belonging to/or associated with pro-market neoliberal capitalist and the global corporations.

Neoliberal economic development borrowed much of its ideals from ‘economic rationalism’ – a viewpoint that places ‘…the dominance of the economy and economic processes over all areas of state policy-making’ (Marginson, 1993; Pusey, 1991; in Codd, p.65). In other words, this doctrine emphasises the search for efficiency as its primary [development] objective.

Obviously, this is the kind of objective commonly found in businesses, companies and corporations of the world, because through efficiency, labour and wages, time and costs can be saved or reduced thereby increasing profit.

However, aid and development work sometimes need to transcend beyond measurable efficiency for something less tangible, something which cannot always be measured through efficiency alone. For instance, there are qualities like ‘happiness’, conviviality and tradition, these qualities exist even before modern development arrived and it may- even redefines the meaning of modern development. For example, Bhutan’s drive to integrate ‘happiness’ into modern development context is worth serious consideration.

The Gross National Happiness or ‘GNH’ (Larmer, 2008, p.130) may well be the missing ingredients of neoliberal economic development.

Clearly the proximity of ‘new aid paradigm’ to neoliberalism will make it difficult for a real paradigm shift to take place – at best it will usher more ‘re-formation’ (as the case with the WB) but probably not a proper transformation in the aid and development work. As the development objective of neoliberal economic globalisation is pro-market and corporation rather than pro-poor.

Resource Conversion: The Fuel of Global Economic Growth and Development

The last stage in Rostovian linear model of development requires ‘High Mass Consumption’ and this fit nicely with neoliberal ideals of ‘market economy’ where economic growth is expected to increase at all times and normally will slowdown only when there is a ‘market-crash’ or economic depression. ‘Normal’ market behaviour is people buying, companies producing, bourses are bullish and the economies growing, but what exactly fuelled all these productivities and growth is the continuous depletion of world’s natural resources. What is really happening here is resource conversion – or borrowing author Derrick Jensen strong description ‘…production is the conversion of the living [resources] to the dead…’ for consumption (Jensen, 2006, p.599) labour included of course. This is the fuel of development, and like fossil fuel or oil, it too may run out one day. Which is useful to remember.

Economists often ‘forgot’ to mention that there are associated costs for economic productivity and growth to happen. However, these ‘costs’ are not simply called cost anymore but hidden under some economic jargon like ‘externalities’. Take the Amazon rainforest for example, unseen and unknown to the many participants of the economic activity is the untold pain and suffering of the marginalised, the minorities and others organisms and species who lost their habitat and lest we forget the forest is also populated by people like you and me who have to sacrifice [unwillingly] their home, their culture or even their life as they stand in the pathway of ‘progress’ and development. Their weak voices were lost and unheard under the cacophony of modern industrial 'progress' and 'development' – surely this cannot be progress nor development.

Neoliberal economic-development according to Friends of the Earth International, has long been brandishing the promise of a ‘win-win’ theory of comparative advantage to address the problem of poverty. However, it was developed when the domestic economies were strong so it has lost its relevancy in the face of a globalised and borderless market. (FOEI, towards sustainable economies, p.7)

Some economic experts point to the so-called ‘poverty-trap’ – the self-reinforcing mechanism that acts as barriers to productive techniques which result from both market and institution failures (Azariadis & Stachurski, 2005, p.297). But how can the poor use, let alone purchase the technology when they are hungry. Economist Hernando de Soto has an interesting argument regarding this, he said the poor are not really poor, but their informal-economic sector lack the formal [legal] recognition for their lands/assets and goods which deprived them from fully participating into the formal economy (de Soto, 2000).

Others development agencies and institutions recommended solution like ‘Sustainable Development’ (SD) which has been around for more than a decade with meagre result, probably because SD is an oxymoronic term in itself.

Because if to develop means to industrialise then it is clear that it will not be [environmentally] sustainable, unless of course the rate of take is less or at least similar to the rate of regeneration. And since not many countries can achieve economic and development progress without utilising their own or others natural resources, environmental degradation is unavoidable. Thus it is obvious that market-economy operation depends upon industrial development, which in turn depends on the conversion of [natural] resources.

This is inline with the explanation of development from  Gilbert Rist, quoted by Andreasson below:

‘‘Development’’ consists of a set of practices, sometimes appearing to conflict with one another, which require—for the reproduction of society—the general transformation and destruction of the natural environment and of social relations. Its aim is to increase the production of commodities (goods and services) geared, by way of exchange, to effective demand (Rist, p.13, cited in Andreasson, 2005, p.60).

When taken in SD context the above explanation is in apparent conflict with the goal contained in the seventh MDGs – which target stated clearly ‘… [to] reverse the loss of environmental resources’ (UN, 2000, MDGs # 7, website).

This is one of the reasons why Brazilian economist Buarque suggested that: ‘The first step towards promoting [any] development must be an independently obtained definition of development’ (Buarque, 1993, p.51). Therefore a country or a nation must be very clear about what is ‘development’ – for whom it is intended and more crucially at what cost is this ‘development’ – which may not be limited only to the dollar value but more than that, because a wrong development program may even cost a [local] culture – the bedrock of civilisation itself.

‘New aid paradigm’: part of the problem or the solution?

The founder of Grameen Bank of Bangladesh, professor Muhammad Yunus said this: ‘…nothing in the world is the single solution…’ during an interview with the BBC News. When this statement is taken into the context of the ‘new aid paradigm’ – it brought the concept of ‘time’ to mind.

‘Time’ here means timeframe – ‘short-term’ and ‘long-term’ – where improvements or efficacy can take place. So, if ‘short-term’ means inching away from the unregulated free-market economy then the Bank and IMF can be said to have improved.

However, for ‘long-term’ improvement of the poor, rhetorical reformation will not do the work. And, expecting total transformation in the aid and development industry under the current market-economy would be unrealistic. In fact the Bank and IMF have done quite well doing some ‘improvements’ regime to keep up with the emerging trends in the aid and development industry. Their positive effort deserved appreciation, the trouble is a ‘short-term’ approach as such is of little benefit for the poor of the world.

For example, the Bank’s departure to their new position was marked by the release of the World Bank’s 2000/1 Development Report on ‘Attacking Poverty’ – which is ironical since the object of the ‘attack’ should have been the pro-corporation short-term policies of neoliberal market-economy itself. In this case, it is sobering to remember one prominent proponent of neoliberal market-economy, the late Milton Friedman who argued that, ‘…the greatest good would be achieved by basing all business decisions on maximising profits for shareholders.’ (Friedman, 1970, cited in NI 407). Reflected in this point of view is its narrow ethics and how ‘short-term’ thinking which benefits the few [shareholders] override ‘long-term’ thinking that benefit the many – in this case [hopefully] the poor.

Poverty in the [modern] world is the systemic by-product of an increasingly globalised neoliberal market-economy. Its modus operandi involves extraction of natural resources for conversion into products. And depending on the scale of the operation, the larger and more industrialised the operation and the more resource it will use. This create imbalances in the scale of world’s resources use and later may develop into social imbalances such as poverty. So until these imbalances are corrected it is unlikely that poverty can be eradicated.

Development based on the ‘new aid paradigm’ is too closely associated with neoliberal market-economy goals—so it is very much part of the problem, therefore it will not serve the purpose of eradicating poverty as mandated in MDGs first goal. The multi-dimensional nature of poverty also cannot be address through uni-dimensionally type of ‘attack’ on poverty. Rather it is more appropriate to pursue the root of poverty, which is inherent in the dominant neoliberal market-economy.

It will take nothing less than a full transformation of current world economic system to undo this dependency on converting natural resources; perhaps even a self-implosion of the whole economic system itself under the pressure of the current global scale ‘triple threat’ of rising food prices, climate change and population growth. The ability to live well based upon long-term steady-state interdependence with intact, healthy ecosystems and their natural capital is lost forever nearly everywhere.

Powerful modern developed countries ‘tool-box’ is full with all kinds of science and technologies, the libraries are full with Eastern and Western wisdom and ethical ideals – why not make best use of it. In the end the choice is mainly in the hands of those in power, those who have the capacity to change and influence policies at many level. It is expected from those who live in modern industrialised environment and have benefited from the last 200 years or so Industrial Revolution [including the elites and privilege of third world nations] to reconsider their collective mode of economic activities. Development itself may become an ethical or even moral question. As sardonically put by Serge Latouche: ‘May the planet perish, as long as development is intact!’ (Latouche, 1997, p.139).

The Evolution of Technical Assistance: from Expertise and Advisory to Facilitating

The dominant paradigm in capacity development is the neoliberal development model which originally can be traced to Rostow’s ‘five stages of development’ and the concept of ‘economic rationalism’ that value ‘efficiency’ as its main motivator. This is such, because efficiency [unlike capacity] is thought to give an edge against the competition.

New Policy Agenda (NPA) is the starting point for international development agencies. Its content is neoliberal economic developments and democratic theories. Agencies the like of WB and IMF and others utilise and modified it according to their needs. However NPA is challenged by the following three points:

1. Western development program is in crisis; 
2. Western dominance is resisted; 
3. Northern NGOs in crisis.

Non-government development organisations (NGDOs) started filling the gap left by state and regulatory body retreats in during the eighties and to a certain extent the nineties.

Many social services that used to be the domain of the state were filled by NGDOs, and it becomes the main vehicle for pressing on NPA decentralisation and democratisation and serves as a link between state and citizenry.

As dissatisfaction grew due to poor cost-effectiveness of the top down approach, giving NGDOs opportunities to serve as tools for bottom up development. With the shifting emphasis in neoliberal development thinking and policies, ‘capacity building’ evolved into Capacity Development Services or CDS.

By the end of 1970s—development policies shift towards a more participatory approach in a bid to involve the poor and the oppressed. Technical Assistance (TA) changes its focus – supports were given to NGDOs private initiative.

The 80s – see TA being pushed to the margin by programme aid. Privatisation continues and state roles reduced. The main theme of 1990s continues along more privatisation and added institutional building its focus. The emphasis is on ‘change’ process of institutions.

And today, capacity enhancements services (CES) provider emphasis is on ‘advisory services’ with focus on organisational development, process approach and later facilitator hence shifting away from expert and advisory services. The outsider [worker] role is to encourage change from directive to non-directive.

The continuum of ‘consultancy’ starts with ‘expertise’ to advisory and later facilitator at the end – with enough room for further role development if needed. In brief the role of an expert is of leadership. The adviser responsibility is for result but not much concerned with the learning process. While a facilitator role is to teach others how to diagnose and constructively intervene when necessary.

The success of capacity enhancement change is to a large extent dependent on consultants’ appropriate roles at appropriate time. Highlighting the importance of sensitivity and awareness when engaging with the client. The ability to listen, to learn and to adapt becomes crucial. As client’s learning obstacle cannot be overcome simply by a prescription from the outside. To awaken this ‘inner’ potential may requires change in [client] mindset and culture from within but can be facilitated from without [by facilitator]. The emphasis here is on the client’s own self-understanding which depending on his/her level of understanding will determine the depth of change.

At the organisation level the focus is now on capacity enhancement. Capacity enhancement values respect, trust, honesty, and recognition of client’s existing capacities. Facilitator attitude should be honest, supportive and sensitive, while making sure their power is not misuse all the while keeping the client in control of the process.

Capacity enhancement providers such as SNV of the Netherlands are working along these guiding principles when dealing with their client:

• demand-driven;
• client-centred; 
• client-led 
• flexible.

Good facilitation process requires facilitator to be conscious of one’s own values and ability to create conditions and mechanism for genuine participation. Equally important is facilitator readiness to adjust and adapt in a dynamic and sometimes unexpected situation.

Conclusion

There are other and better alternatives to prosperity and away from the tyranny of poverty [and corporations]—but it will take nothing less than a ‘transformation’ in the mindset of the public. Keeping the ‘business as usual’ way of life will not help to reduce poverty and hunger.

Reconsideration of what is progress and development according to one’s own understanding, cultural and traditions context is crucial. What is good for one particular person, localities, countries and region may not be good for others.

Once the meaning of progress and development is clear then [each] can adapt a road map but always aligned to the greater good of the planet as a whole. Appropriate use of all human faculties to act and react with planetary dynamics is not only important but urgent. The room for doubt in our own capacity is over—the ‘triple-threat’ of rising food prices, population growth and climate-change is too huge to be ignored. Taking into account that natural resources are decreasing and limited, surely development must be geared for long-term steady-state interdependence with whatever is [still] intact in the planet’s ecosystems. The ability of the inhabitants of this planet to live well within this limits is paramount for sustainability.

The concept having or owning ‘less’ is important to get acquainted with, because having less is not the same as living in poverty. The rule for any systems [economic system included] is: the more complex a system is, the more resilient to stress or collapse. One has to reflect on this otherwise sustainability is a distant dream.

Education has an important role to play by imparting ideals, principles and practices of sustainable-living development, so that the general public has deeper understanding of what sustainability really is, and this is especially true for those with commanding economic power. Biologist Stephan Harding summed up development as: ‘…to be truly sustainable, development would be aimed at ensuring that the amount of matter flowing through the global economy would either shrink or be at a steady state.’ (Harding, 2006, p.233).

And finally, as often reminded by economist and poverty expert professor Jeffrey Sachs, ‘...we have the technologies and financial resources to eradicate poverty’(Sach, 2005, p...). Which also reminds us about the moral and ethical obligations of those well equipped with advanced technologies and abundant financial resources — lest they forget.

References

Andreasson, S. (2005). Accumulation and Growth to What End? Reassessing the Modern Faith in Progress in the “Age of Development” Capitalism Nature Socialism 16(4), p.60. Retrieved on 22 April 2008 from http://works.bepress.com/stefan_andreasson/4

Azariadis, C. and Stachurski, J. (2005), Poverty Traps. In P. Aghion and S.N. Durlauf (Eds.), Handbook of Economic Growth (p.297). Amsterdam: Elsevier.

Bartlett, D. EU global poverty goal threatened by Europe business reporter, BBC News retrieved on 10 April 2008 from http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/business/7339325.stm

Buarque, C. (1993), The End of Economics? Ethics and the Disorder of Progress (p.51). London: Zed Books

De Soto, H. (2000), The Mystery of Capital (pp.32-54). London: Bantam

Friends of the Earth International, (n.d.). towards sustainable economies, (p.7) Retrieved April 23, 2008 from http://www.foei.org/en/publications/pdfs/sustain-e.pdf

Grafton, Q.R. and Pezzey, C.V.J. (2005), Economics of the environment. In R. Quentin Grafton, Libby Robin and Robert, J Wasson (Eds.), Understanding the environment: bridging the disciplinary divides (p.53). Sydney: UNSW Press book.

Harding, S. (2006), Animate Earth: Science, Intuition and Gaia (p.233), Foxhole, Dartington, Totnes, Devon, UK: Green Books Ltd.

Jensen, D. (2006), Endgame (p.599). New York: Seven Stories.

Larmer, B. (2008). Bhutan’s Experiment. National Geographic, March 2008, (p.130).

Latouche, S. (1997). Paradoxical Growth. In Majid Rahnema and Victoria Bawtree (Eds.), The Post-Development Reader (p.139). London: Zed Books.

Marginson, (1993); Pusey, (1991). In Codd, J., Educational Reform, Accountability and the Culture of Distrust: Study Guide 1 (p.45). Palmerston North, New Zealand: Massey University College of Education.

People versus corporations. (2007) New Internationalist, 407, December, (pp.12-13).

Sachs, Jeffrey D. (2005). In The End of Poverty: Economic Possibilities for Our Time (p...).

New York: Penguin Group

UN Millennium Development Goals, Retrieved April 23, 2008 from http://www.un.org/millenniumgoals/

Waldman, M. (2008, March 26). Many aid promises proving empty. The NZ Herald, p. B1.

Anthropologist Wade Davis talks about Ethnosphere

Listen to Davis's stories...listen twice or thrice then think...thank you : )

Decolonization and Development by Makarand Paranjape

The Enemy Within I

STUDENT: We agreed that in order to decolonize ourselves we would have to fight against an exploitative world order outside. We also saw how this world order was supported by us, the very people who suffer from its ill-effects.
TEACHER: The ‘us’ that you refer to above needs to be defined. Again, we could start with what happens to the psyche of a society, which has been colonized’
The experience of colonialism is traumatic, both economically and psychologically. It produces some peculiar kinds of neurosis or anxiety. Frantz Fanon has written at length about the pathologies of oppression—what the oppressed suffer under colonialism. It seems to me to be fairly clear that when the self is under tremendous stress, it copes or survives through certain devices. Societies, too, evolve their own coping strategies to deal with sudden, unwanted changes in internal and external environment; they devise various means to minimize and reduce the resulting cognitive dissonance.’
STUDENT: You mean societies also resort to denial, repression, transference, displacement, or sublimation—sort of like Freud’s defence mechanism?
TEACHER: The mechanisms and methods are, really, numerous. But I wish to concentrate on a few which will help us identify the ‘enemies’ within our society.
Colonized societies, often, use at least two self-destructive methods of coping with theirs trauma. First, the exploitative and reactionary elements within these societies become stronger, encouraged and patronized by the colonizers. Secondly, a new class of assimilated natives—carbon copies of their masters— develops.
STUDENT: You mean, the self is under tension all the time; but under colonialism, the tension becomes unbearable. This results in a split. That is, a part of the self ‘goes over’ to the adversary, becomes its mirror image. Another part retains pristine values.
Even if there is no split, there is continual tension between the acquired self and the older self, between the colonized and the pre-colonial, between the new and the old.
TEACHER: This sort of thing is happening all the time, not just under colonialism but also under neocolonialism.
STUDENT: Hence a novel like Samskara?’
TEACHER: And indeed all those novels which show a conflict between tradition and modernity, between the East and the West.
STUDENT: So isn’t the tension creative?
TEACHER: It may be. But often it is debilitating. Very few people can move from their confused tensions to the clarity of self-expression. That requires deep understanding and enquiry.
STUDENT: So how is this related to the enemy within?
TEACHER: The enemy within is that aspect of the psyche which has internalized the values of the colonizer. These values prevent the decolonization of the mind. They create confusion and inertia.
STUDENT: But by contrary implication, can one decolonize oneself entirely? Can one remove, excise, or terminate that part of one’s mind which has been occupied, colonized, and penetrated by the adversary?
TEACHER: Not unless one is looking at the problem in Manichaean terms. You can never completely rid yourself of your opposite, your other, because, in a sense, you are the other. But certainly through understanding, through knowledge, through enquiry, one can arrive at a stage where one’s own shaping influences are clarified. Then they cease to threaten and overwhelm one. Then one can employ them creatively and usefully as Gandhi said we could English education if we only understood what it stood for (Hind Swaraj, 90—91).
STUDENT: So you are suggesting no radical removal of a part of the psyche, but its transformation.
TEACHER: Right. The colonized part of the mind mustn’t dominate one’s thinking. It mustn’t cause confusion and self-contempt. It must be understood and tamed. This would be a positive method of coping, somewhat like sublimation.
STUDENT: What about the other ‘enemy’, that aspect of the oppressive pre-colonial past which lingers on or is actually strengthened?
TEACHER: I’ll illustrate with two examples, one economic and the other cultural, of what actually happened in India after the British took over our economy. Because the burden of taxation on the peasant became fixed and unbearable, the village money-lender assumed a key position in the economy. A lot of small peasants had to mortgage or lose their land, which led to untold hardship. Similarly, the institution of sati reached epidemic proportions in Bengal. Thus, several reactionary and destructive forces and traditions were strengthened under colonialism.’ One cannot also help remembering how important a role the local tribal chieftain played in the slave trade in Africa. often actively assisting the capture and sale of his own people.
STUDENT: Colonialism also led to revivalism—the glorification of our past beyond all reason—almost in a desperate bid to preserve our identity.
TEACHER: In fact, even the residual past. traditional values, which one has inherited from one’s pre-colonial heritage can he harmful. That too can be a kind of colonization. Moreover, It might merely be a reconstruction by the colonized of their past.’
STUDENT: We seem to have tied ourselves into knots. What’s the way out?
TEACHER: I think we must remember that decolonization implies rejection not only of the harmful ideas from the West. but also of destructive aspect of our past.
The way out is to radically question the given—whether it comes from the West or from India. Only a deep questioning will lead to clarity about who we are and where we are going. Questioning only the West will lead us to unacceptable positions from our past; questioning only our past and accepting the West on trust will make us more powerless and self-contemptuous.
STUDENT: If we question everything, then where does that leave us?
TEACHER: It leaves us free to act as nothing else can.
STUDENT: Then what about the enemy within?
TEACHER: The enemy within is thus tamed, harnessed to a new programme in which its knowledge is useful but not enslaving. The enemy within is thus disarmed and integrated into a newer understanding of reality.
STUDENT: You mean through deep questioning, we deconstruct the enemy within; uncover its premises, decode its secret language—thereby rendering it harmless.
TEACHER: Yes, something like that. But also once we have understood the causes of the tension, we must act. There can be no truce with the enemy within. We must ruthlessly pursue this enemy to its lair and expose its machinations.
STUDENT: Can you give an example?
TEACHER: Well, I need to ask myself, which values of the West have I really accepted and which have I denied?
STUDENT: Isn’t that difficult? Aren’t the strands hopelessly intertwined?
TEACHER: Yet, an effort is needed. For instance, do I accept that the goal of life is to achieve a progressively more humane, just, and materially comfortable social order on the basis of technological invention? I must ask myself this if I think that this is what the ‘good’ West represents. Then I must ask what goals from my own culture, dharrna [Sanskrit: to hold, carry, maintain] or moksha [to let go,liberation] for instance, do I wish to retain. Are these compatible with progressive humanism of the West? And, finally, can a viable synthesis be worked out?
STUDENT: Usually, the problem is much more mundane: do I buy a VCR or washing machine?
TEACHER: Ha, ha! Then you will have to come to terms with what the VCR represents. Who produces it? How much it costs? And what do you have to do to be able to possess it? But with the advent of Cable TV, I can safely advise you against buying it.
STUDENT: OK, but that doesn’t solve the problem of whether or not to buy a microwave, a washing machine, an air conditioner, and so on. I know people who will literally take a bribe to get these goods because their prices in India are so high.
TEACHER: There you have your answer. If the prices are so high, there is a reason for it. Excise, duties, whatever be the reason; if the good that you wish to possess is beyond your reach, then in order to acquire it you will have to breach some norm of conduct. This in turn will affect your country because it encourages corruption, false values, and so on. So in your particular case, a microwave or a Maruti car is out!
STUDENT: Thank you. But can we go back to decolonization?
TEACHER: I said that the enemy within prevents decolonization. It wants to continue with its slavish ways, either blindly following tradition or chasing an illusory modernity.
There is a similar split in the social self. A small section of an elite fringe gets totally Westernized. This fringe becomes a kind of comprador faction within our society. It collaborates with the exploitative world system.
STUDENT: This fringe is probably not a fringe at all—I see all of us to be a part of it, in one way or another.
TEACHER: Yes, the middle class, the bourgeoisie, is the most vulnerable to the lure of the West and of modernity. That’s why, as we said earlier, we have to split it!
STUDENT: Then the internal enemy is really all of us as a group, not just a part of our individual psyche.
TEACHER: Yes.

Notes

1. See Frantz Fanon, The Wretched of the Earth (Harmondsworth: Penguin,
2. 1967) and Renate Zahar, Frantz Fanon: Colonialism and Alienation (New York: Monthly Review Press, 1974). Also see Ashis Nandy, The Intimate Enemy: The Loss and Recovery of Self Under Colonialism (1983; rpt. New Delhi: OUP, 1988) for a valuable and lucid discussion of some of the issues raised in this chapter.
3. See Anna Freud, The Ego and the Mechanisms of Defence (1937; rpt. Madison, Ct.: Inter-Universities Press, 1967).
4. See Alert Memi, The Colonized and the Colonizer, tr. Howard Greenfield (Boston: Beacon Press, 1965).
5. By U.R. Anantha Murthy, tr. AK. Ramanujan (1978; rpt. New Delhi: OUP. 1989).
6. See Bipan Chandra et al., Freedom Struggle (1972; rpt. New Delhi: National Book Trust, 1991) for all excellent introductory account of the economic effects of British colonialism. See Ashis Nandy, ‘The Sociology of Sati,’ Indian Express, 5 October 1987; this and other articles on the subject can be found in Sati edited by Mulk Raj Anand (Delhi: B.R. Publishing Corp., 1989).
7. See Raymond Williams, ‘Base and Superstructure in Marxist Critical Theory,’ in Problems in Marxism and Culture (New York: Schocken, 1981) for a discussion of residual culture.

The Enemy Within II

STUDENT: You have defined the enemy within as that section of our population which is not really interested in decolonization.
TEACHER: And there are at least two distinct groups of such people. The older vested interests, exploiting the residual culture, and the neo-colonized urban elite.
STUDENT: But isn’t the first group, more or less, defeated?
TEACHER: Only partly. The back of the priestocracy is broken; it cannot terrorize people in the name of God and religion. But there is a new class of neo-Hindus, kulaks, caste lords, brokers of backwardness (not to be confused with those who are really backward), and so on. Worst affected by this new combination of rapacity born out of a commercial culture and the older, oppressive culture are our women. Lower class/caste and rural women are the most exploited and oppressed section of our population.
STUDENT: We need a separate chapter to discuss the question of women in our society. But, briefly, how do we dismantle older, traditional tyrannies?
TEACHER: By a two-pronged strategy: first, by redefining tradition and drawing inspiration from it to fight its abuse, as all social reformers from Rammohan Roy to Gandhi did. Secondly, to repudiate certain aspects of tradition altogether, as lower caste reformers such as Jyotiba Phule and Ambedkar did, when they rejected Brahminism and Hinduism. In both cases, we can also judiciously apply several liberal and humanistic correctives— drawn from moderity—to tradition, thereby challenging and revitalizing it. Of course, there are some who think that tradition, modified, is entirely self-sufficient; on the other hand, there are those, like our Marxists, who think that modernity is entirely self-sufficient.
STUDENT: We can talk about these strategies in greater detail later. Here I wish to devote more attention to the enemy within—the latter, urban, Westernized kind.
TEACHER: This section is happy enough with the subordinate position that India occupies in the world order as long as it continues to enjoy a place of prominence within India.
STUDENT: But can you please relate this idea to our central concern with Svaraj or the decolonization of our culture and society?
TEACHER: Let me ask you. rather provocatively, who is interested in decolonization? Who among our politicians or academicians or even artists is really committed to it?
STUDENT: Do you want me to mention names?
TEACHER: Try even that if you wish. You’ll find only a very few. Because decolonization is not very simple.
Instead, you’ll find most people pretty much satisfied with the compromises that they have reached.
We all talk of decolonization today. But how many of us really want it?
STUDENT: Yes, come to think of it, I can think of very few of our teachers or scholars who have really achieved a breakthrough. But isn’t everybody speaking of it nowadays? Aren’t books being written and papers published on the subject?
TEACHER: Yes, hut that’s the point, isn’t it? Today. it has become fashionable to speak about decolonization. But nobody wants to actually get there. They want to remain colonized intellectually, but to continue to speak of decolonization.
STUDENT: How startling! You mean it’s like the man who goes around saying I want to be enlightened, but never becomes enlightened?
TEACHER: You see, this very project of seeking God becomes a way of postponing the finding. Krishnamurti points this out very clearly. He regards all our efforts at freeing ourselves to be a camouflage of our deep fear of freedom; we are merely putting off the inevitable. Our quest becomes the baggage that we carry around, that is our new crutch, our excuse, our security blanket. Remove even that and we’d be nowhere.’ Those who speak of decolonization have made it not only a way of life but also a way of earning their livelihood. It is their ultimate crutch and solace. It gives them a sense of being on the right side of things ideologically. It gives them security and assurance.
STUDENT: Aren’t we also speaking of it? So are we really ready for it? Are we also making it merely a topic of conversation? How are we different from them?
TEACHER: That is a question each one must ask himself or herself. This discussion, to me, is our immediate contribution to decolonization. We must decolonize ourselves even as we proceed in this dialogue. Otherwise, we shall have failed completely.
STUDENT: Do you mean to say that most of us are not really interested in decolonization?
TEACHER: Some are merely cynical. They use it as the latest bandwagon, to acquire all the worldly advantages. Others are more serious, but confused. They don’t know a way out.
STUDENT: You are speaking against some of my favourite young teachers, especially the foreign-returned ones, fresh with the latest imported ideas. What is your evidence to prove that they are mistaken?
TEACHER: For one thing, the discourse of decolonization that they deploy is itself totally colonized. That is, this discourse has been penetrated by the West, appropriated by it, and made a part of its market. Hence, these days, it pays to speak of decolonization. The West’s own motives for this self-flagellation are interesting. It helps assuage their guilt but also earns them money because it sells. Finally, it confers power and becomes a way of recolonization. As long as they control the discourse of decolonization, they are preventing decolonization.
STUDENT: Amazing!
TEACHER: But more convincing evidence is seen in the absence of any radical or meaningful understanding of decolonization from within our academia. We are merely duplicating the latest trends in the West. Our great concern is not to be left behind. We want to prove that we understand what is going on and are ‘with it’.
A real concern with decolonization would result in ending, not perpetuating, our dependency on the West. Are our intellectuals interested in this? Or are they interested in acting as middlemen or brokers in this unequal exchange, thereby ensuring that their position, their scholarships, their trips abroad are not threatened?
The Indian intellectuals, especially the professional ones, have a hit of the cheat and an idler in them. They don’t want to think for themselves. They would rather live with what K.C. Bhattacharya called the shadow mind: a realm of borrowed ideas and thoughts. They would rather not question their place in the Western-dominated global intellectual system.
So they’re not interested in decolonization at all, but continue to speak of it.
STUDENT: This hypocrisy is frightening. Rather like a radical Marxist professor who rakes in a huge profit by moonlighting as a real estate agent. These people want to be pure ideologically. but as bourgeois as possible in their daily lives.
TEACHER: It’s the old problem of means and ends which obsessed Gandhi. If you want to decolonize, but everything you do actually leads to further colonization, then you have a very big contradiction in your life.
STUDENT: Is everyone who speaks of decolonization the enemy within?
TEACHER: I hope not, otherwise this dialogue would be meaningless.
I used the instance of the discourse on decolonization as an example of how something so seemly anti-colonial can lead to further colonization. The enemy within academics is that section of our intelligensia which perpetuates our position of inequality and inferiority.
STUDENT: How do they do this?
TEACHER: By accepting Western notions of what our goal as a society is.
STUDENT: I think this is where their attitude to tradition becomes important.
TEACHER: Yes. It seems to me that the enemy within has accepted a largely Occidental version of what the world should be like. They have accepted the Enlightenment and its totalizing project of changing the world. They have accepted History and the idea of a linear progression for human kind. They have accepted scientific materialism. They have, in a word, accepted modernity
STUDENT: Do you mean to say that we should revert to some premodern. Hindu view of the world, the so-called spiritual goal of culture? What about the oppressive aspects of our tradition?
TEACHER: Let us not make the mistake of thinking that we can automatically reoccupy some ideal space from the past from which we are today divorced. Such an idea may serve as a cementing factor, imbued with tremendous emotional appeal to a beleaguered culture—and the best example of this is perhaps Iran—but it is still a chimera both theoretically and practically.⁴
To question modernity does not make one a die-hard obscurantist, revivalist, or traditionalist. I mentioned earlier that one must he equally critical of tradition as one is of modernity.
I would agree with Ashis Nandy when he says that the debate today is between the critical traditionalists and the critical modernists.’ However, I am not very sure how critical our Indian modernists are.
Perhaps, I should rephrase Nandy: the struggle is between those who are critical and those who are not—whether traditionalist or modernist.
STUDENT: But where does this take us as far as the issue of decolonization is concerned? Don’t you think that decolonization implies a conflict between the West and India, and therefore that’s where we must turn our attention?
TEACHER: Yes. But we have tried to see that this fight is not so simple and clear-cut as it seems. The West must be defined. Those aspects of it which are inimical must be resisted. At the same time we have seen how our own response is by no means uniform, how much we ourselves contribute to our continued domination, and how little we have actually done towards our own decolonization.

Notes

1. For an introduction to Krishnamurti’s thought, see Mary Lutyens. ed.. The Penguin Krishnamurti Reader (Harmondsworth: Penguin. 1970) and The Second Penguin Krishnamurti Reader (Harmondsworth: Penguin. 1972). Also see Luis SR. Vas, ccl., The Mind off. Krishnamurti (1971; 2nd. rev. ed. Bombay: Jaico, 1975) for a set of readings on Krishnamurti.

Perkembangan Desentralisasi di Indonesia - Neil McCulloch IDS

[...] As a result it is broadly the same local elites that are in charge, and, in some cases, have used decentralisation as a tool for self-enrichment and political patronage. The pattern is often the same – a candidate buys a candidacy from a political party, using funds from private sector backers to pay. Then, when in office, procurement rules are rigged to ensure that the same private backers get paid back handsomely for their investment.

The Decentralisation of Indonesia – What happened after the Big Bang?

By Neil McCulloch

I’m just back from a fascinating conference on Democratisation and Decentralisation in South East Asia, with a focus on evaluating ten years of Indonesian decentralisation.

Indonesia undertook a “big bang” decentralisation in 2001, shortly after the overthrow of long-time dictator Suharto in 1998.  Suharto had, for more than 30 years, run one of the world’s most centralised states, with everything that matters decided in Jakarta.  The fledgling democratic Indonesia took a huge gamble in decentralising most functions of government to the district governments.  Each district now has its own directly elected mayor or district head, as well as an elected parliament.

It’s hard to overestimate what a gamble decentralisation was.  After the horrendous ethnic conflict and bloodshed, collapsing economy and political chaos of 1998, many commentators suggested that Indonesia might break up, or descend into civil war.  Not only has this not happened, but Indonesia is now widely regarded as an example of how to make the transition from autocracy to a functioning unitary democracy with a free press.  As Marcus Mietzner’s argued in his keynote address at the conference, given Indonesia’s history and conditions in which decentralisation occurred, the outcome has been remarkably good.

At the same time decentralisation has not been a roaring success either.  For all the hype about bringing decision making closer to the people, public services have not improved, poverty remains high, and corruption is pervasive.  My own talk showed that a new measure of the quality of economic governance at the district level is uncorrelated with local economic performance.  In other words, sadly, good governance doesn’t help you grow. 

The reason for this is probably the same as the reason why services haven’t improved.  Although millions of Indonesians are now participating in elections, the same “money politics” determines who the candidates are.  As a result it is broadly the same local elites that are in charge, and, in some cases, have used decentralisation as a tool for self-enrichment and political patronage. The pattern is often the same – a candidate buys a candidacy from a political party, using funds from private sector backers to pay.  Then, when in office, procurement rules are rigged to ensure that the same private backers get paid back handsomely for their investment.

But none of this is unique to Indonesia.  Such “elite capture” happens the world over.  As Andrew MacIntyre and Douglas Ramage have nicely put it, “Indonesia is a Normal Country”.  And, little by little, improvements are coming.  The anti-corruption commission is investigating a large number of cases and has already put offenders in jail; local electorates routinely kick out officials that they know to be corrupt.  The key challenge going forward will be to strengthen accountability for delivering genuine improvements – better services, jobs and poverty reduction.  Only when local leaders start to lose their jobs because they failed to deliver, will we be able to declare Indonesia’s decentralisation a success.

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