{"id":930,"date":"2019-08-24T16:46:47","date_gmt":"2019-08-24T14:46:47","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.convivialthinking.org\/?p=930"},"modified":"2019-08-26T08:04:31","modified_gmt":"2019-08-26T06:04:31","slug":"elephants-in-the-development","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/convivialthinking.org\/index.php\/2019\/08\/24\/elephants-in-the-development\/","title":{"rendered":"Elephants in the \u2018development\u2019 room \u2013 a response to Julia Sch\u00f6neberg and Henning Melber"},"content":{"rendered":"

by Su-ming Khoo<\/em><\/p>\n

This blog post responds to earlier posts by Julia Sch\u00f6neberg<\/a> and Julia Sch\u00f6neberg and Henning Melber<\/a> registering continuing disenchantment with \u2018development\u2019, concern with a lack of consensus and common definition, and calling for its abolition. Julia\u2019s first blog<\/a> argued that we should not become the unwitting bearers of a vision of development that we disagree with, and that serves the interests of the most privileged. Three decades after it first emerged, \u2018postdevelopment\u2019 is enjoying a moment of renewal. \u2018Development\u2019 disavowal is accompanied by proposals, for example Orbie and Delputte recently called for a halt to EU aid and development cooperation<\/a> and abolition of the EU Development programme, and its eventual replacement with a \u2018Post-development Commissioner\u2019 .<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

In this post, I acknowledge the critique of \u2018development\u2019 and endorse the importance of critical development theory. I agree with the reforms proposed for a new, European \u2018post-development policy\u2019. However, I want to emphasise that the call for abolition is problematic \u2013 the existence of the office and agency represent official commitments to enact cooperation and the rhetoric of disavowal is problematic on its own because it confuses the specific and material dimensions of injustice \u2013 cognitive, distributional and political and denies the conative (striving) aspect of development, as well as the importance of the agency that has most responsibility for action \u2013 the state.<\/p>\n

As Pieterse<\/a> points out, the post-development perspective is merely one of several critical approaches to development. The Latin American \u2018Dependency school\u2019 has addressed the question of global inequality much more directly than postcolonial theory. \u2018Alternative development\u2019 highlights the need to address the question of popular participation<\/a> and the democratization of development processes. Human development addresses the normative foundations of human wellbeing and flourishing. Post-development is not all that different to these alternatives in criticizing the underlying motives and outcomes of \u2018development\u2019, but what sets it apart is its rejection of the concept of \u2018development\u2019 as the problem in itself.<\/p>\n

But I\u2019m going to stick my neck right out here and suggest that we should not rush to \u2018end development\u2019 \u2013 for at least two reasons. The first, notwithstanding perfectly good reasons for wanting to dissociate ourselves from colonial development, is that development isn\u2019t<\/em><\/strong> \u2018ours\u2019 to end<\/em><\/strong>. The second is that ending the use of the term will not itself result in moving the elephant out of the room<\/strong>. It veils the problem and underwrites the persistence of what Hickel calls \u2018New Optimism\u2019.\u00a0<\/a> \u2018New Optimism\u2019 obscures more radically redistributive alternatives. Meanwhile, social progress, by renaming, obstructing and eliding public debate about what the latter means .<\/p>\n

Let me explain my two main reservations<\/p>\n

Development isn\u2019t \u2018ours\u2019 to end<\/strong><\/p>\n

First, I disagree with the objection that \u2018development\u2019 has \u2018too many\u2019 meanings \u2013 indeed I suggested (Khoo 2015)<\/a> that we need to understand \u2018development\u2019 as an emergent and contested concept, and accept that different understandings emerged out of different struggles, each with their own context. In this sense, less<\/em><\/strong> consensus is needed, not more, for alternatives to emerge. What we should give up is our desire <\/em><\/strong>to be the creators of consensus and our need to control the discourse as if \u2018development\u2019 belongs to \u2018us\u2019. We do not need \u2018develop\u2019 less, but we do need to cooperate more. By insisting that \u2018development\u2019 is a monolith, we monopolize its meanings and obscure politically and historically important visions and proposals that have emerged, not just from outside the global North or West but also within Northern\/Western societies. I agree that the Eurocentric, modern-colonial \u2018mainstream\u2019 of \u2018development\u2019 should be rejected, along with its implications of resource and territorial annexation and racist epistemological ordering. These fundamental structural properties of \u2018development\u2019 and the dominating, partial and false universalisms that accompany them must be rejected. But when we talk about nothing but this \u2018failed\u2019 version of \u2018development\u2019, we also strenuously avoid and silence alternative versions and ongoing struggles to redefine \u2018development\u2019 and cooperation in different ways. Many alternative perspectives critique and demand overhauls without rejecting \u2018development\u2019 outright. \u00a0The term still means something to many people, even those who have \u00a0problems with it. \u2018Development\u2019 means having an intentional perspective on the present, and a sense of disappointment with the present, as well as hope and striving for a future that is different and possibly \u2018better\u2019. It also usually directs its critiques to specific political authorities \u2013 governments and international organizations, and tasks these agencies with the duties to act.<\/p>\n

The elephant AKA DWEIB<\/strong><\/p>\n

My second discomfort is concerned with the very obvious elephant in the room: \u00a0growing global inequality. Julia and Henning, in the preface of their blog piece<\/a>, \u00a0raise the issues of the rise of right-wing populism, predatory capitalism and authoritarian regimes. They criticise the World Bank\u2019s growth orientation and point to its stubborn blanking of growing global inequality. This \u2018blanking\u2019 creates an implicit sense of acceptance. I find this most uncomfortable \u2013 the unwillingness to address the elephant in the room directly makes it seem like we are okay with it being there. Roge Karma\u2019s recent piece<\/a> in Current Affairs\u00a0 gives the elephant a name – \u2018DWIEB \u2013 don\u2019t worry (about inequality), everything is better now\u2019.<\/p>\n

DWEIB is reflected in an important 2013 paper on global inequality (Lakner and Milanovic, 2013)<\/a> that presented an elephant-shaped graph depicting the world\u2019s poorest as \u2018catching up\u2019, becoming \u2018non-poor\u2019 and \u2018graduating\u2019 into a new \u2018global median class\u2019. The poor\u2019s incomes (in the \u2018rump\u2019 of the elephant) are depicted rising rapidly, driven by trends in India and China. The \u2018rump\u2019 of the elephant seems to describe recent world economic growth as an era of developmentalism, distributing shared prosperity through economic growth:<\/p>\n

\"\"
Source: Lakner, C.; Milanovic, B. (2013)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Lakner and Milanovic suggest that China \u2018graduating from the bottom ranks\u2019 \u2013 was the biggest element modifying the overall shape of the global income distribution and creating an important global \u201cmedian\u201d class. Note that this graph focuses on income growth rates, not actual income or wealth. The kink in this good news story is obviously the cohort of \u2018losers\u2019 –\u00a0 the downward-sloping \u2018forehead\u2019 of the elephant, whose share of world income growth is declining. It is politically significant because this is a politically influential section of society \u2013 the better-off middle class in the richer countries who have been relied upon to support national and global social-redistributive policies and social cohesion, but seem no longer wiling to play ball. In truth, the \u2018face of the elephant\u2019 does not tend to look at its own behind \u2013 at how \u2018well\u2019 the very poor are doing \u2013 instead their attention fixes on the gap between their prospects and those of the richest in the top 1%, whose growth gains are rising rapidly and to an extraordinary extent\u2013 the very tip of the \u2018elephant\u2019s trunk\u2019.<\/p>\n

The DWEIB story is simplified to remove this \u2018kink\u2019 if we opt for an even simpler graph, from the Max Roser open-source development data resource \u2018Our World in Data\u2019. This unambiguously shows the bad thing going down (number of people living in extreme poverty) and the good thing going up (number of people not in extreme poverty).<\/p>\n

\"\"
Our World in Data, 2018<\/a><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

This was the \u2018data\u2019 that Henning and Julia mentioned, that encouraged the conservative Brookings Institution to announce in September 2018 \u00a0that \u2018the poor and vulnerable will no longer be a majority in the world.\u201d This view directly contradicts other analyses by Oxfam and other left-leaning economists like Piketty, Atkinson, Bourguignon and Hickel that wealth and income inequality are increasing very dramatically and worryingly. Roge Karma coined the \u2018Don\u2019t Worry, Everything Is Better now\u2019 (DWEIB, pronounced \u2018dweeb\u2019) to describe the abuse of simplified data<\/a> to defend the status quo. The problem with this poverty graph is the incredibly low defining line distinguishing \u2018poor\u2019 and \u2018not-poor\u2019 – $1.90 a day PPP, that is what $1.90 would buy you in the USA. This low threshold results in the \u2018facts\u2019 showing fewer people in poverty and poverty going down, despite other data showing hunger rising. $1.90 would not buy you adequate nutrition, let alone shelter, clothing, health care or education in the USA. Promoting the understanding of \u2018development\u2019 in terms of economic growth shares is unsustainable and oppressive, and so is defining \u2018poverty\u2019 as low as $1.90 PPP a day. This amounts to exactly enough to buy one large portion of fries in McDonalds and, literally, nothing more. Hickel suggests that a more realistic global absolute poverty line is at least $6.50 a day PPP. The national absolute poverty line for the USA it is actually $15 a day\u2019 (Kenny and Hickel 2018).<\/a><\/p>\n

The elephant in the room is how a relational measure of inequality has been replaced by an absolute conception of poverty, an elephant known as DWEIB.<\/p>\n

Untying the elephant from \u2018development\u2019 is impossible<\/strong><\/p>\n

Postcolonial studies has successfully allowed us to question the metanarratives and parochialize so-called universalisms. However, an inclusive future requires a different intellectual framework for understanding the nature of oppression, given the consolidation of intolerable inequalities, within and between the Global North and Global South. While decolonial theorists call for more incommensurability so that the Global South can resist Euro-centrism (Lal 2012)<\/a>, this should not negate the need to understand the shift in the global language and frame for discussing inequality as a global problem. The decision to reframe poverty using a very minimal level impacts how much inequality matters to us, while avoiding any discussion of maximally capture of income growth by the top 1%. This level of income, wealth and growth capture directly influences money-politics, vote-rigging, the decline of redistributive social policies and the rise of rightwing populism.<\/p>\n

The development crises we face are crises of world-making. We wish to avoid \u2018replacing one amoeba with another\u2019 and recognise that \u2018sustainable development\u2019 and \u2018transformation\u2019 are just as vague and potentially status quo and system-serving as \u2018development<\/a>\u2019. I agree that there are good reasons for \u2018ending\u2019 Eurocentric forms of development that harm, exploit, extract and fail to do good. However, replacing the term \u2018development\u2019 with other words no matter how meaningful-sounding, will not be enough to form a bulwark against social corrosion, nor can it produce substantive, shareable hope and meaningful cooperation. Removing the word \u2018development\u2019 and the agencies tasked with cooperation, no matter how badly they do it, will still not change our thinking if we refuse to think honestly about global and within-country inequality.<\/p>\n

Su-ming Khoo<\/strong><\/a> is lecturer in the School of Political Science and Sociology at NUI Galway. She is interested in development, human rights and higher education.<\/span><\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

by Su-ming Khoo This blog post responds to earlier posts by Julia Sch\u00f6neberg and Julia Sch\u00f6neberg and Henning Melber registering continuing disenchantment with \u2018development\u2019, concern with a lack of consensus and common definition, and calling for its abolition. Julia\u2019s first blog argued that we should not become the unwitting bearers of a vision of development … Continue reading “Elephants in the \u2018development\u2019 room \u2013 a response to Julia Sch\u00f6neberg and Henning Melber”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_bbp_topic_count":0,"_bbp_reply_count":0,"_bbp_total_topic_count":0,"_bbp_total_reply_count":0,"_bbp_voice_count":0,"_bbp_anonymous_reply_count":0,"_bbp_topic_count_hidden":0,"_bbp_reply_count_hidden":0,"_bbp_forum_subforum_count":0,"om_disable_all_campaigns":false,"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"_uf_show_specific_survey":0,"_uf_disable_surveys":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[21,28],"class_list":["post-930","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-speaking","tag-development","tag-post-development"],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/convivialthinking.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/930","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/convivialthinking.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/convivialthinking.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/convivialthinking.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/convivialthinking.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=930"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/convivialthinking.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/930\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":938,"href":"https:\/\/convivialthinking.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/930\/revisions\/938"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/convivialthinking.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=930"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/convivialthinking.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=930"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/convivialthinking.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=930"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}