| CODE | ANT2088 | |||||||||
| TITLE | International Development, NGOs and Poverty | |||||||||
| UM LEVEL | 02 - Years 2, 3 in Modular Undergraduate Course | |||||||||
| MQF LEVEL | 5 | |||||||||
| ECTS CREDITS | 4 | |||||||||
| DEPARTMENT | Anthropological Sciences | |||||||||
| DESCRIPTION | This study-unit begins with a survey of socio-economic development in world history and the theories of historical development. It then critically considers Economics as a key type of development discipline, by studying the question: do economists analyze economic activity as 'impartial observers', or as actors who perform and even generate the policies of development? After introducing development in history and economics, this study unit then focusses on the various public meanings of 'development' as an approach to social life and as a social practice. It concentrates on the ways that anthropologists have written about development policies and practices in 'underdeveloped' countries, by comparing case studies of governmental and international projects. Then, the study-unit critically explores the emergence of NGOs as key players in 'development'. The theoretical section of the study-unit ends by looking at how anthropologists are unpacking the whole concept of 'poverty' and ask: do approaches to 'poverty' by economists and development policy makers help communities, or do they help political elites? Finally, there is a practical section in which students explore in depth two ethnographic studies of development in different parts of Africa. Study-unit Aims: This study-unit is designed firstly to enable students to realize that the current debates in, and language of, development policies and practices are the outcome of a long historical process; secondly, to enable students to place the academic disciplines, government policies, and practical policy applications of development in their specific social, cultural, and political settings; and thirdly, to equip students with the methods developed by anthropologists for evaluating and comparing different development ideologies and practical projects. Learning Outcomes: 1. Knowledge & Understanding: By the end of the study-unit the student will be able to: 1. write a clear summary of the different approaches to development policy and practice as developed in either the West or in Asia, Africa, and Latin America, and applied in 'developing' countries; 2. compare in speech and in writing the similarities and differences between governmental and NGO approaches to, and practices of, development; 3. describe in speech and in writing the social and the cultural environment which needs to be understood before any development strategy can be designed appropriately or implemented practically; 4. to write at length in a clear fashion how knowledge of past development successes and failures provides a guide to the relevance or otherwise of present policies and projects. 2. Skills: By the end of the study-unit the student will be able to: 1. (generically) specify in speech and in writing how development policies and practices are the outcome of local politics and cultural attitudes; 2. (practically) decode the language of particular development policies and practical projects in local settings, so that the student sees that they are responses to particular local pressures, contain particular values about how the world should work, and make particular assumptions about how the human world actually works. Main Text/s and any supplementary readings: Main Texts: - Landes, D. The Wealth and Poverty of Nations. Abacus (1998) - MacKenzie, Fabian, and Sin (eds) Do Economists Make Markets? Princeton University Press (2007). - Mitchell, T. Rule of Experts. University of California Press (2002) - Peet, R. and Hartwick, E. Theories of Development. Guilford (2009). - Sen, A. Development as Freedom. OUP (1996) - Gardner, K. and Lewis, D. Anthropology, Development, and the Post-modern Challenge. Pluto (1996) - Escobar, P. Encountering Development: The Making and Unmaking of the Third World. Princeton (1995) - Ferguson, J. The Anti-Politics Machine: 'Development', Depoliticisation, and Bureaucratic Power in Lesotho. Cambridge (1990) - Clough, P. and Williams, G. ' Decoding the Berg Report: The World Bank in Rural Northern Nigeria', in M. Watts (ed) State, Oil, and Agriculture in Nigeria. University of Callifornia Press (1987) Supplementary Texts: - Hart, K., Laville, J-L., and Cattani, A. (eds) The Human Economy. Polity (2010) - Kay, John. The Truth about Markets. Penguin (2004) - De Sardan,O. Anthropology and Development. Zed. (2005) - Said, M. Development in a Tsunami Village of Sri Lanka. M.A. Dissertation (2009) |
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| STUDY-UNIT TYPE | Lecture and Group Learning | |||||||||
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| LECTURER/S | Maurice Said |
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The University makes every effort to ensure that the published Courses Plans, Programmes of Study and Study-Unit information are complete and up-to-date at the time of publication. The University reserves the right to make changes in case errors are detected after publication.
The availability of optional units may be subject to timetabling constraints. Units not attracting a sufficient number of registrations may be withdrawn without notice. It should be noted that all the information in the description above applies to study-units available during the academic year 2025/6. It may be subject to change in subsequent years. |
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