Development studies: past and future
Frances Stewart
What is ‘development studies’?
Development studies is an inter-disciplinary and
multidisciplinary enquiry into change and social
transformation in less developed parts of the world;
attempts by states to define themselves...to regulate and
control the shape and order of change; attempts by people
and institutions to engage with, ignore or resist the processes
of transformation.. their struggles to give purpose and
meaning to the changes they experience; and the impact of
forces of change on the economy, institutions and people at
every level’ (Introduction to Oxford Development Studies,
1996) .
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Many tensions and questions
What is development; what is progress?
Geographical area covered;
Tension between analysis and prescription;
When do we start?
 Should development studies encompass development and
analysis of change in 18th and 19th century Europe.
 Here start after second world war, when many colonies
gained independence.
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Early conscious efforts to promote development
From North, Truman 1949:
‘we must embark on a brave new programme for making the
benefits of of our scientific advances and industrial progress
available for the improvement and growth of underdeveloped
areas….The old imperialism is dead’.
From South, Malahalanobis (India); Prebisch (Latin America),
planning for growth.
United Nations: 1948 The Universal Declaration of Human Rights:
Everyone has the right to a standard of living adequate for the
health and well-being of himself and of his family, including food,
clothing, housing and medical care and necessary social services,
and the right to security in the event of unemployment, sickness,
disability, widowhood, old age or other lack of livelihood in
circumstances beyond his control.
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A multidisciplinary enquiry?
Early decades dominance of economics.
Increasing role for political science, anthropology, sociology,
history.
 Economics very prescriptive with a simplified view of
human motives and behaviour;
 Anthropology observes and explains behaviour; not
prescriptive and can oppose change;
 Political science helps explain why prescriptions are (or are
not) put into effect.
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Development studies dominated by North
In University departments in North
By World Bank
And by people educated in northern universities.
Notable and important exceptions:
 Raol Prebisch and dependencia theorists (LA)
 Arthur Lewis; Walter Rodney (West Indies; Guyana)
 Samir Amin; Mahmood Mamdani; Damiso Moyo (Africa)
 Many Indian economists, above all Amartya Sen
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Major changes in thinking since 1950
In objectives of development: briefly from growth to human
development
And in process: from planning to free market
Changes followed a cyclical logic:
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Diagrammatic representation of the development thinking cycle
‘External’
events
The ‘facts’ : situation in
developing countries
Policy
impact
Theories
Policies
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Advanced
country
thinking
Interests and
politics
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Stages of analysis and policy (1)
1950s-1970s
1950s and 1960s: Catch up: Growth maximization;
industrialisation; planning (Lewis; Nurkse, Ranis and Fei;
Mahalanobis).
1970s – in response to consequences of this strategy:
 dependencia (Frank; Furtado; Cardozo; Rodney; Amin)
 Basic Needs (ILO; Streeten; Stewart)
 Efficiency critique (Little, Scitovsky and Scott; Balassa;
Krueger; Lal; Little).
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Stages of analysis (2)
1980s and 1990s
1980s: debt crisis; stabilisation and adjustment; rising
poverty; output falling.
New consciousness of poverty:
 Adjustment with a Human Face (Cornia et al);
 Sen’s capability approach
 Chambers’ participatory approach
 Human Development.
1990, first Human Development Report (UNDP)
1990 World Development Report on Poverty
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Analytic contribution of capability approach:
displaces income as measure of progress
Pluralistic: many valuable and incommensurable goods
Importance of agency
Process important as well as end.
New measures of progress, such as HDI; MPI.
Pluralism reflected in MDGs (2000) and SDGs (post-2015).
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Stages of analysis and policy (3): 2000s
Consequence of MDGs: big focus on social objectives;
economy neglected.
Aid revived. But does aid help? (Sachs; Easterly)
Randomised methods to assess efficiency of social
interventions (Duflos; Kremer; Banerjee)
Questionning of macro-economic orthodoxy (Stiglitz:
Rodrick; O’Campo).
New structuralist macroeconomics (Bresser-Pereira ; Cornia)
Importance of institutions (North; Acemoglu and Robinson)
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Challenges for Development Studies posed
by
world
of
today
1. Rising inequality in many countries. Importance of
horizontal inequality.
2. Rise of BRICS – new models; new opportunities.
3. Overwhelming priority of environment: yet not
incorporated fully in development studies.
4. Rising vulnerability through:
 Environment; natural disasters.
 Conflict and political instability.
 Globalisation, migration….
 Need prevention, protection and compensation
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Political economy
Understanding political determinants of policy
Role of collective action
Conditions for collective action
Fragility of democracies
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Development studies should encompass whole
world
Heterogeneity of developing countries – some with higher
income than ‘developed’
Problems are in common – inequality; vulnerability;
migration; political economy.
Yet departments are strictly segmented.
Integration is major challenge for next decades.
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