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March
2024

Development: A North-South Debate

In the name of aid, progress, growth, empowerment or sustainability, development has always had the sense of being something "good" or "positive". But poverty and inequality are outcomes of the systematic and unequal integration of "poorer" countries into the global economic structures. Learn more about this with a timeline of western development politics, its criticism and movements fighting for alternative concepts to improve and change the world.

Development in Politics

Whether it's called development aid, development cooperation or development policy - development is a controversial field in politics and repeatedly sparks criticism and debate. Generally speaking, development can be understood as activities that aim to improve a country's economic, social, societal or technical situation.

 

Who Really Benefits From the Development

Graphic with many arrows
Even if this concept of development sounds neutral at first, it is not. It implies the idea of a "highly developed", "modern" and "civilized" (external link, opens in a new window)west, that helps the global south to "progress" by providing technology, money and culture. In a way, the world remains divided: between the West and the rest, the developed and the underdeveloped, those in possession of solutions and those in need of help.

Critical Perspectives of Capitalist Development

As it turns out, global inequality is not a technical problem or a flaw in the system, but one that requires rethinking society as a whole. Development policy is an important means for the West to stabilize and constantly re-establish this global injustice and dominance in the world. So if we want to criticize the understanding of development described above, we must also question all the principles associated with it: A worldview that favors and centers Europe (Eurocentrism), capitalism and economic growth in general.

 

The following video provides a fundamental critique of the idea of development as economic growth. It aims to help analyze this system and take a critical perspective on the subject.

Critical perspectives of capitalist Development

Decolonizing and Re-imagining Development

The ideas of capitalism and development are spread throughout Western societies in a very dominant way; to the extent that it seems almost impossible to change anything or imagine alternatives. While the Global North is fundamentally founded on capitalism, for ‘developing’ countries capitalism is the goal they are supposed to strive for. In this context, it is high time to challenge these dominant concepts:

  • by moving away from the European experience of industrial growth and capitalist expansion
  • by shifting the focus away from current understandings of economy
  • by decolonizing policies in relation to development.

In the following method, you can learn about some ideas to transform and decolonize development.

Decolonizing and Re-imagining Development

Alternative concepts, grassroots movements and resistance against capitalist development

Alternatives to development does not mean looking for alternatives to development or alternative ways to become like the West. Rather, it involves a fundamental shift from the universal model of Western development to existing alternatives of self organizing among those most affected from the development project. Alternatives come from the grassroots movements and local communities from around the globe, especially in the Global South.

The following world map provides an interactive learning experience to the user with a compilation of concepts, worldviews, practices, social movements and resistances that question the modernist ideology of development and go beyond those practices based on their cultural contexts.

Alternative Concepts, Grassroots Movements and Resistance Against Capitalist Development

Sources: Development

Using and Sharing!

This article is part of the series Exiting the Crisis! - Understanding Crises and Paths to Global Justice, which was produced in cooperation with Konzeptwerk Neue Ökonomie (external link, opens in a new window). Online Editing by Alina Kopp. This article is published under the terms of the Creative Commons License CC BY 4.0 (external link, opens in a new window)! Share, use or adapt it for your educational work. Don't forget to republish it under the same conditions and mention L!NX and the authors.

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