Showing papers on "Underdevelopment published in 2012"

Globalization and its Discontents

Abstract: In this issue of the journal, William Robinson offers his analysis of the rise of transnational elites emerging outside of the traditional frame of nation-based capitalism. What is significant, in large part, is that unlike their national-capital predecessors, this new cadre has little concern for all that we refer to as social reproduction, industrialization, and local development. In its place, argues Robinson, are elites guided by a definition of global development rooted in the expansion of global markets and the integration of national economies into a global capitalist reality. This picture is a logical extension of a narrative that takes capitalism from a period of internationalization to globalization, and while the distinction between these two periods of capitalist development remains somewhat unclear we can agree significant changes are underway. The pages of this journal have recently explored the nature of class politics in globalization (Berberoglu, 2009; Kollmeyer, 2003; and Sakellaropoulos, 2009), the reconceptualization of globalization through a gender lens (Acker, 2004; Gottfried, 2004; and Ng, 2004), the impact of globalization on workers (Archibald, 2009a, 2009b) and the way the rhetoric of the core penetrates other regions of a globalizing economy (Barahona, 2011). Robinson’s article, and the critical exchange between Robinson and commentators in this issue, shifts our attention away from what we mean by globalization and its impact, and towards the question of who now manages this new global economy and what that means. The neoliberal agenda, and apparently the focus of transnational elites, is the expansion and reliance on ‘the market’ and a return to pure laissez-faire practices. The role of markets is the central piece, for example, in the current efforts to restructure the failing economies in Europe and the underpinning of the criticism that markets should be freed from the fetters of government regulations that introduce inefficiencies and are to blame for the economic ills that have befallen the major capitalist economies of the world (Fuchs, 2010). We now know all too well, so we are told, that a correction requires a heavy dose of austerity and the shrinking of the social supports provided by national governments. Otherwise local economies will fail to participate in the growing global economy and nations will fall into unimaginable poverty. The writings of Andre Gunder Frank (especially 1966, 1971) foreshadow the current argument, though I am certain not in the way he would have imagined. For Frank, while post-World War II capitalist countries may have been undeveloped at some point, the rest of the post-colonial world suffered from underdevelopment – that is, from a process that maintained poverty and economic hardship as a result of their relationships with so-called modern capitalist countries. The very forces of capitalism instituted well-documented practices of extracting resources and maintaining low wages in order to increase profits (practices that persist today, if not in the same form). At the same time, to ‘encourage’ development, governments and global financial institutions like the IMF and World Bank provided huge loans so that these countries could ‘afford’ to modernize rapidly. These loans were accompanied by massive intervention 440404 CRS0010.1177/0896920512440404EditorialCritical Sociology 2012

Does the Leader's Ethnicity Matter? Ethnic Favoritism, Education, and Health in Sub-Saharan Africa

Abstract: In this article we reassess the role of ethnic favoritism in sub-Saharan Africa. Using data from 18 African countries, we study how the primary education and infant mortality of ethnic groups were affected by changes in the ethnicity of the countries’ leaders during the last 50 years. Our results indicate that the effects of ethnic favoritism are large and widespread, thus providing support for ethnicity-based explanations of Africa's underdevelopment. We also conduct a cross-country analysis of ethnic favoritism in Africa. We find that ethnic favoritism is less prevalent in countries with one dominant religion. In addition, our evidence suggests that stronger fiscal capacity may have enabled African leaders to provide more ethnic favors in education but not in infant mortality. Finally, political factors, linguistic differences, and patterns of ethnic segregation are found to be poor predictors of ethnic favoritism.

Between Corruption and Development: The Political Economy of State Robbery in Nigeria

Abstract: The study is based on the hypothesis that there is a link between corruption and underdevelopment and that corruption is responsible for the shortcomings and poor performance of the Nigerian political economy. In addition to examining the historical trajectory of corruption in Nigeria, this paper delves into the underlying causes of corruption as well as its cumulative impact on national development in the country. Lastly, the paper assesses some public and private sector initiatives that have been taken and that might stem the tide of corruption.

Media, Communication and Development: Three Approaches

Abstract: Media, Communication and Development: Three Approaches critically investigates the three approaches that have characterised most debates in the field of Media, Communications and Development since its emergence in the 1950s, namely, media development, media for development and stakeholder and community engagement The book thus addresses the extant gap in scholarship in the field and includes a chapter on impact evaluation, which current scholarship has either ignored or footnoted In addition, the book uses case studies from both the global south and the global north to attend to complex and multidisciplinary concerns with participation, power and empowerment The author brings in postcolonial perspectives to demonstrate that the use of MCD approaches emerged in response to the growing problems of underdevelopment, and not necessarily to western development theories Using simple language that is at the same time theoretically engaged, he opens up the field to scholars across a large number of disciplines

A desindustrialização no Brasil

Abstract: The text analyzes the contemporary deindustrialization of Brazil and some of its impasses in terms of macroeconomic policies. The level of industrialization that was reached in previous decades has deteriorated because of the lack of policies on industry and development and the combination of high interest rates, lack of investment, overvalued exchange rates and exaggerated trade openness. In this context, harmful deindustrialization occurs. It weakens and undermines the country's economy. In the absence of a macroeconomic policy in line with industrial policy, development is compromised. In these terms, underdevelopment is not a phase or a bump in the road, but a process that began with Brazil's involvement in the international capitalist market in the nineteenth century - a process which Brazil has yet to complete.

Transnationalism and Development: Mexican and Chinese Immigrant Organizations in the United States

Abstract: The literature on development in economics and sociology has tended to focus on capital flows, investments, and, more recently, institutions as key causal factors. International migration, when discussed, is relegated to the status of a symptom of underdevelopment and even a factor contributing to it. The more recent literature on migrant remittances has partially reversed this view by documenting large hard currency transfers made by expatriates to their home countries. This changed approach to migration and development does not go far enough because it does not take into account the organized efforts of immigrant communities themselves. Nor does it consider important developmental synergies produced by the rising interactions between immigrant organizations and sending-country governments. Using data from a recently completed comparative study, we document these processes for two major countries of out-migration—Mexico and China. The study compiled inventories of migrant organizations from both countries in the United States, interviewed leaders of the major ones, and complemented these data with interviews with officials and community leaders in each sending country. Profiles of these transnational ties were constructed, exemplifying their increasing density and developmental impact at the local and national levels. Theoretical and policy implications of the findings are discussed.

The dual nature of local content in Angola's oil and gas industry: development vs. elite accumulation

Abstract: After decades of underdevelopment and conflict in the face of massive resource wealth, Angola is putting in place new strategies to dramatically increase its participation in its oil & gas and related services sectors. Although ‘local content’, or ‘Angolanizacao’, has been in place for decades, it has largely failed to increase the developmental benefits accruing from the country's resource wealth. The new local content push is likely to succeed at promoting economic growth. However, the policies have also become important mechanisms for unequal growth and new forms of elite accumulation. This paper reviews the historical context, legal framework, and current impact of local content in order to emphasise their dual role in creating development while concentrating elite power in Angola.

Tectonic shifts : Haiti since the earthquake

Abstract: The 7.0 magnitude earthquake that hit Haiti's capital on January 12, 2010 will be remembered as one of the world's deadliest disasters. The earthquake was a tragedy that gripped the nation - and the world. But as a disaster it also magnified the social ills that have beset this island nation which sits squarely in the U.S.'s diplomatic and geopolitical shadow. Particularly, the quake exposed centuries of underdevelopment and recent economic policies and the rampant inequality and exclusion within Haiti. Tectonic Shifts offers a diverse on-the-ground set of perspectives about Haiti's cataclysmic earthquake and the aftermath that left more than 1.5 million individuals homeless. Following a critical analysis of Haiti's heightened vulnerability as a result of centuries of foreign policy and most recently neo-liberal economic policies, this book addresses a range of contemporary realities, foreign impositions and political changes that occurred during the relief and reconstruction periods. Analysis of these realities offers tools for engaged, principled reflection and action. Essays by scholars, journalists, and activists, Haitians still on the island and those in the diaspora, highlight the many struggles that the Haitian people face today, providing lessons not only for those impacted and involved in relief, but for people engaged in struggles for justice and transformation in other parts of the world.

Sustainable indigenous futures in remote Indigenous areas: relationships, processes and failed state approaches

Abstract: In many Indigenous territories, continuing processes of primitive accumulation driven by governments’ claims to resources and territory simultaneously deny Indigenous rights and insist on market forces as the foundation for economic and social futures in Indigenous domains. Drawing on research in North Australia, this paper identifies the erasure of Indigenous governance, the development of wickedly complex administrative systems, continuing structural and procedural racism and state hostility to Indigenous rights as constructing Indigenous vulnerability to poverty, addiction and underdevelopment. Shaping sustainable Indigenous futures in remote areas that are characterised by long-term development failure requires rethinking of remote local and regional economic relationships. Recognising remote regional economies as hybrid economies that rely on environmental, social and cultural wealth is an important first step in reorienting policy settings. It is also crucial that we acknowledge sustainable Indigenous futures cannot arise from policy interventions that rely on creating wealth for state and corporate appropriation and assume enough of this wealth can be redistributed to local Indigenous communities to constitute ‘development’. Politically constructed crisis interventions, such as Australia’s recent actions in remote Northern Territory communities, represent a failure of state relationships rather than an appropriate and sustainable response to the challenge of Indigenous vulnerability. This paper argues that attention to Indigenous rights and development of good relationships and good processes of governance, autonomy and responsibility within communities as well as between them and governments is fundamental to sustainable Indigenous futures. Without this, neither government programs nor large-scale natural resource-based development projects can deliver sustainable futures for remote Indigenous groups.

China in Ethiopia: diplomacy and economics of Sino-optimism

Abstract: This article examines the motive behind China's increased activities in Ethiopia in recent years and concludes that it lies in Ethiopia's perceived diplomatic usefulness. If China's relations with many African countries could be described as one of "infrastructure for natural resources," the Sino-Ethiopian relationship can be described "infrastructure for diplomatic support." After exploring the nature and scope of Ethiopia's relations with China and highlighting areas of divergence of interest, the article seeks to demonstrate how the convergence of interests between the two countries has ushered in a period of Sino-optimism among Ethiopia's elite and rising expectations among ordinary Ethiopians. Resume: Cet article examine les motivations derriere l'intensification recente de l'activite Chinoise en Ethiopie et conclut que l'Ethiopie est consideree par la Chine comme un allie diplomatique utile. Si les relations de la Chine avec bien des pays africains pouvaient etre decrites comme un "echange d'infrastructure contre des ressources naturelles," la relation sino-ethiopienne peut etre vue, elle, comme "un echange d'infrastructure contre un soutien diplomatique." Apres avoir explore la nature et l'etendue des relations entre l'Ethiopie et la Chine, et apres avoir mis l'accent sur les zones de divergence d'interets, cet article vise a montrer comment la convergence d'interets entre les deux pays a ouvert la voie d'un cote a une periode de "sino optimisme " pour l'elite ethiopienne, et de l'autre a des attentes grandissantes venant de la population generale. China-Africa Relations: A Framework for Analysis In general, three strands of thought inform the on-going debate about the long-term impact of China in Africa: Sino-optimism, Sino-pragmatism, and Sino-pessimism. From the perspective of Sino-optimism, China's re-entry into Africa is to be celebrated; Africa stands to gain much from closer Sino-African relations. From the perspective of Sino-pragmatism, China's greater involvement in Africa may be neocolonial in consequence, if not in intent, since the logic of capital is the same whether those in the driving seat are Europeans, Americans, or Chinese. But it is nevertheless too early, pragmatists say, to make a sweeping judgment on whether the disadvantages of a deeper Afro-Chinese economic engagement will outweigh the advantages for Africa, and China should be given the benefit of the doubt. According to the Sino-pessimist paradigm, Africa's engagement with China will perpetuate the structure of dependency and underdevelopment that is already in place and, moreover, inhibit or block Africa's efforts to overcome it. In the case of Ethiopia, all of the above perspectives are discernible in discussions about the potential impact of Sino-Ethiopian relations, but it is Sino-optimism, as this article will elaborate, that captures the mood of the moment. Sino-Ethiopian relations have passed through three stages, which will be discussed below: the imperial period, the Dergue period, and the Ethiopian Revolutionary Democratic Front (EPRDF) period. In order to highlight contemporary features, the bilateral relationship in the EPRDF period (1991-2011) will be broken down further into four phases. The Imperial Period (1923-74) and the Dergue Period (1974-91) Ethiopia's interest in Asia beyond the Middle East dates back only to the 1920s, but the country that captured Ethiopia's attention in (East) Asia in the Imperial period (1923-74) was Japan. For historical and ideological reasons, China was perceived as the "Other," and this image persisted even in the wake of Prime Minister Zhou Enlai's visit to Ethiopia in 1964, the establishment of formal diplomatic relations between the two countries in 1970, and Emperor Haile Selassie's visit to China in October 1971. 2 When the Ethiopian military officers (the Dergue) deposed the emperor and seized political power in 1974, Sino-Ethiopian relations were still in a stagnant state. …

Poverty in Common: The Politics of Community Action during the American Century

Abstract: After the Second World War, the idea that local community action was indispensable for the alleviation of poverty was broadly embraced by US policymakers, social scientists, international development specialists, and grassroots activists. Governmental efforts to mobilize community action in the name of democracy served as a volatile condition of possibility for poor people and dispossessed groups negotiating the tension between calls for self-help and demands for self-determination in the era of the Cold War and global decolonization. In Poverty in Common , Alyosha Goldstein suggests new ways to think about the relationship among liberalism, government, and inequality in the United States. He does so by analyzing historical dynamics including Progressive-era reform as a precursor to community development during the Cold War, the ways that the language of "underdevelopment" articulated ideas about poverty and foreignness, the use of poverty as a crucible of interest group politics, and radical groups' critical reframing of community action in anticolonial terms. During the mid-twentieth century, approaches to poverty in the United States were linked to the racialized and gendered negotiation of boundaries—between the foreign and the domestic, empire and nation, violence and order, and dependency and autonomy.

Discussing Neopatrimonialism and Patronal Presidentialism in the Central Asian Context

Abstract: The concept of patrimonialism is both multidimensional and multidisciplinary Its origins lie in Max Weber's sociology of domination and legitimacy, which defines three types of authority: traditional, charismatic, and legal-rational bureaucratic According to Weber, institutions are the impersonal source of individual bonds in Western democracies, while the separation of public and private does not exist in ancient or medieval patrimonial societies1 In the 1960s, African independence revived debates on "modern patrimonialism" and the personal rule that seemed to define many sub-Saharan African regimes2 In 1973, following the work of Guenther Roth on "modern patrimonialism," Shmuel Eisenstadt proposed to employ the prefix neo- in order to dissociate a patrimonialism based on the traditional legitimacies from contemporary regimes that rely on more diverse mechanisms of legitimation, for example, taking into account the influence of external actors and a more binding international legal system3 Although this addition makes sense at the empirical level, it has remained controversial because the border between "traditional" and "modern" is slipperyBy the 1970s, the concept of neopatrimonialism quickly gained quasi-hegemonic status in the study of sub-Saharan Africa, largely through the work of Jean-Francois Medard However, the term became a kind of catch-all concept, "in danger of losing its analytical utility"4 and encompassing very diverse and sometimes poorly defined phenomena In their seminal work Democratic Experiments in Africa, Bratton and van de Walle have advanced the discussion by stating that neopatrimonialism, unlike patrimonialism, co-exists with rational-legal legitimacy The success or failure of transitions in sub-Saharan Africa must therefore take into account contingent factors like military interventions, political protests, and pro-democratic opposition, as well as international dependence5 More recently, the reflections of Erdmann and Engel have demonstrated that neopatrimonialism can be defined primarily by its conflicting norms It is based on the close interaction between patrimonialism (all power relationships are personal relationships) and legal-rational bureaucratic domination (the distinction between the public and the private formally exists and is accepted, even if it is not respected)6 Neopatrimonialism is therefore defined primarily by the hybridity between two logics of domination and legitimacy, a characteristic-hybridity-that is also found within the debates on the post-Soviet space that interest us here7The concept of neopatrimonialism is multidimensional because it is multidisciplinary, which may explain its catch-all character, but also guarantee its heuristic scope A product of political science, neopatrimonialism also spread to economics and has ventured into the lands of anthropology and sociology-neopatrimonial practices as an extension of patriarchal domination beyond the boundaries of kinship The dominant economic reading has emphasized the weight of neopatrimonial practices in order to understand the poor performance of many developing countries, or even their underdevelopment, the so-called "low" equilibrium or poverty trap8 The concept also has been frequently used in the debate over rentier economies, as rent-seeking and neopatrimonial practices are mutually reinforcing patterns toward non-productive economic activities9 However, economics has been slow to actually include this concept in its theoretical studies because it requires a non-quantitative approach to economic developments and invites major international financial institutions to consider the human factor in their development strategies10 The more conventional concepts of corruption, weak institutions, and poor governance were selected to express the human role in economic mechanisms that are often elaborated in an abstract and decontextualized mannerParadoxically for a concept coming from political science, the place of neopatrimonialism in the typology of political regimes and of regime changes was discussed only recently …

Stabilisation policies in developing countries after the 2007-08 food crisis.

Abstract: Conventional best practice advice for risk management strategies tends to focus on long-run agricultural development, trade liberalisation, the provision of safety nets and private market solutions to risk. However, if world price spikes like those observed in 2008 are an infrequent but real event, policy recommendations need to take into account the greater prevalence of market failures in many developing countries and associated underdevelopment of marketing institutions. While policy should rely on liberal trade in most years, a short-run stocks policy may be a viable option, due to delays in import arrival, imperfect information on the harvest, and inter-seasonal price dynamics. Moreover, trade policy adjustments are likely to be perceived as necessary when infrequent world price spikes reoccur. The challenge to implementing such policies lies in ensuring consistent, predictable and transparent governance so that interventions make outcomes better, not worse.

Rethinking State Socialist Mass Women's Organizations: The Committee of the Bulgarian Women's Movement and the United Nations Decade for Women, 1975-1985

Abstract: During the UN Decade for Women, representatives of the world’s governments came together for the first time to discuss the issues of equality, development, and peace in official intergovernmental forums, opening up an unexpected new front in the ongoing Cold War. While western women were concerned with legal and economic equality, socialist women in the Eastern Bloc argued that women’s equality with men was useless in a world full of racism, violence, underdevelopment, colonialism, and war. Over the course of the decade, women from the developing world came to embrace the idea that feminist struggles could not be separated from the underlying political and economic conditions in which women lived, aligning themselves more closely with the socialist world. Through a case study of the Bulgarian Women’s Movement, this article presents the UN Decade from the socialist women’s point of view, and argues that their contributions to the early international women’s movement should no longer be ignored.

French and underdevelopment, Haitian Creole and development: Educational language policy problems and solutions in Haiti

Abstract: This article argues that Haiti’s French-dominant school system is an impediment to the nation’s development, whereas Haitian Creole-dominant education will lay the foundation for long-term development. In that Caribbean country, 95% of the population is monolingual in Haitian Creole while the portion that additionally speaks French does not exceed 5% with an additional 5–10% having some receptive competence (Valdman 1984: 78; Dejean 2006). Even though French is the language of the school system, as many as 80% of Haiti’s teachers control it inadequately and only a minority of students completes school (Dejean 2006). Economic, historical, sociolinguistic, and demographic factors are a part of the explanation for Haiti’s low educational achievement. Another important but often ignored factor is educational language policy. Data on educational language policy compared internationally show that the use of a second language in schools correlates with high illiteracy rates and poverty (Coulmas 1992). I reject arguments in favor of maintaining French-dominant education in Haiti (Lawless 1992; Youssef 2002; Francis 2005; Ferguson 2006, etc.) because the resources for it are woefully lacking. I argue that the progressive promotion of Haitian Creole throughout Haitian education will lead to improved learning, graduation, and Creole literacy, in addition to a more streamlined and coherent State, economy, and society (Efron 1954; De Regt 1984; DeGraff 2003; Dejean 2006). As Haiti rebuilds after the earthquake of January 12th, 2010, aid workers, government employees, and researchers who get involved in the recovery also unsuspectingly perpetuate French, English, and Spanish hegemony in development work (DeGraff 2010). The long history of suppressing Haitian Creole and promoting French in education and administration — and French, English, or Spanish in development work — form underlying obstacles in the nation’s struggle to produce an adequate class of educated citizens, to achieve universal literacy, and to make socioeconomic progress.

The Politics of Modern Central America: Civil War, Democratization, and Underdevelopment

Abstract: This book analyzes the origins and consequences of civil war in Central America. Fabrice Lehoucq argues that the inability of autocracies to reform themselves led to protest and rebellion throughout the twentieth century and that civil war triggered unexpected transitions to non-military rule by the 1990s. He explains how armed conflict led to economic stagnation and why weak states limit democratization - outcomes that unaccountable party systems have done little to change. This book also uses comparisons among Central American cases - both between them and other parts of the developing world - to shed light on core debates in comparative politics and comparative political economy. This book suggests that the most progress has been made in understanding the persistence of inequality and the nature of political market failures, while drawing lessons from the Central American cases to improve explanations of regime change and the outbreak of civil war.

Towards a New Map of Africa

Abstract: Introduction * Need for a Replacement for Africa in Crisis * Homogenizing Complexity * Twenty Years on from Africa in Crisis * What's Happened to the Crisis since Africa in Crisis was Published? * Arguments Old and New * Signs of Success * Running Out of Time? * How Can Our Book Contribute? * Part I: Human Ecology * Land-based Livelihoods * What are Rural Livelihoods? * Unfolding Livelihoods in West Africa * Two Cases * Fishing Livelihoods: Successful Diversification, or Sinking into Poverty? * Diverse People and Livelihoods * Fisheries as a Growing Livelihood Opportunity * The Attraction of the Fisheries Sector * Effects on Livelihood Security and Sustainability * Coping Strategies at Micro and Macro Levels * Urban Livelihoods * Framing Urban Livelihoods * Making a Living * Maintaining Social Networks and Urban Communities * Mounting Collective Action * The Challenge of HIV/AIDS * HIV/AIDS and its Potentially Devastating Impacts * Positive Anomalies * Avoiding the Trap * Food Security * Food Security: The Definitional Quandary * Vulnerability Discourse, Monitoring Practice and Food Aid * Description of Famine Early Warning Systems in Africa * Critical Assessment of Early Warning Systems in Africa * Recommendations for Best Practice * Part II: Institutional Change * The Global Economic Context *The Promise of Globalization and Achievements * The Failed Promise of Growth * Explaining the Poor Performance: Has Africa Adjusted? * Africa Maladjusted: The Low-growth Path * Legal Frameworks * The Roots of African Poverty and Vulnerability * Can African Governments Use Law to Restructure Dysfunctional Institutions? * How Africans Designed Laws * Legislative Theory and the Use of Law for Institutional Transformation * Gathering the Facts * The Politics of Decentralization * Fetters on Decentralization * Means of Resistance: Powers Transfer and Institutional Choice * National Institutions for Development: The Case of Botswana * Theorizing the Botswana State * Elite Unity, Underdevelopment and State Autonomy * Conscious Leadership and Class Unity: The Foundation of State Capacity * Identity and National Governance * The Colonial State and Legally Inscribed Identities * Post-colonial Dilemmas * Political Identity: A Methodological Consideration * Regional Economic and Political Institutions * The Southern African Development Community (SADC): A Historical Overview * Regional Transformations in the 1990s: Implications for SADC * Institutions for Conflict Resolution and Peacemaking * Human Rights and Conflict Management in Africa: Five Propositions * Enhancing Understanding * Part III: Conclusions * Agenda for Action * What African Civil Society can Do * What African Governments can Do * What Donors and International Organizations can Do * What Non-governmental Organizations can Do

Rights and the city: an exploration of the interaction between socio-economic rights and the city

Abstract: In a rapidly urbanising society and against a background of rural underdevelopment, cities are increasingly the locations for access to basic socio-economic amenities and essential services. Access to the city and everything that it offers therefore impacts profoundly on the manner and extent to which poor and marginalised persons access the objects of their constitutionally ensconced socio-economic rights. Conversely, the content of the ‘right to the city’ is impacted by legal understandings of the ambit, scope and enforceability of socio-economic rights. Either way, the South African Constitution’s entrenchment of rights to access water, housing, health care services and education, alongside its guarantee of a substantive right to equality, mean that urban design, policy making and regeneration processes have become increasingly legalized and will increasingly be tested for constitutional compliance, especially in instances where they have the effect of excluding poor and marginalised persons from the city. This article begins to unpack the interrelationship between constitutional rights and the right to the city, focusing specifically on the impact of rights-based litigation and judgements on urban policy making, design and regeneration in South Africa.

Female Husbands in Igbo Land: Southeast Nigeria

Abstract: Introduction The concept of patriarchy is not new. Indeed, it has been an age long defining concept in gender relations the world over. In Africa for instance though cultures that operate matriarchy as a social system abound, its application is only limited to inheritance. Generally it has been argued by scholars that there could be no absolute practice of either patriarchy or matriarchy. (1) Nevertheless, patriarchy largely dominates most of the world's social system today. A popular altercation to the practice of this social system has been that of woman to woman marriage, an improvisation to sustain patriarchy, but a negation of its definition and import. That woman to women marriage or female husbands was more pronounced than might be supposed especially in Africa where it occurred in over 30 societies, including; the Igbo of southeastern Nigeria, the Zulu of Southern Africa, the Nuer of East Africa etc., is incontrovertible. Indeed, it suggests the flexibility and dynamism that have attained gender roles in Africa. Patriarchy: a Conception or Misconception? Conceptually, patriarchy has been defined in various ways by scholars. It has been defined as a social system wherein the family headship and along with it power and possession passed from the man on to his sons. (2) It also referred to a social system in which men wielded all the powers and used it only to their own advantage. For the purpose of this work, the latter definition seemed more significant. Since it was normal for authority to go with function, patriarchy as practiced in Africa naturally assigned authority to the men for the system had allowed them all the powers and its use. Consequently, since they wielded all the powers and the discretionary right to use it, it was only natural that they were bound to use it selfishly. One of the functions bestowed on the men by the system of patriarchy was the headship of the family. And since the family remained the smallest building block of the society, though not exclusive, the men became the leaders of the society by extension. According to Chinweizu, (3) "the patriarch zone of function and authority includes the physical protection of the homestead and its territory, the male economic sphere..., the spiritual sphere..., the social sphere." The matriarch zone of function on the other hand restricted the women to the kitchen, cradle, the female economic sphere, mostly perceived as demeaning for men to venture or intrude into. These socially ascribed functions inhibited women's participation in public life, since they were to be seen and not heard. The concept of patriarchy permeated every aspect of societal life, in every age, so much so that even most religions especially the major ones: Christianity, Islam and Judaism, preached patriarchal ideologies. Indeed, the masculinisation of the gods of these religions was an affirmation of the patriarchal dispositions of their parent societies and cultures. Such dispositions and perceptions led to the marginalization and underdevelopment of women. This however, was consequent upon the ambience of anti- women cosmologies of other civilizations and the destruction of the knowledge of other people of women which led to the emergence of only "one monolithic scientific paradigm in all its rationality and objectivity which dominated all civilizations with a patriarchal order which denied all women." (4) In Europe for example, though the ideals of equality of the genders, women empowerment and liberation, feminism and other ideals that were geared towards the elimination of the vestiges of patriarchy emerged and despite all the mobilization and even legal support in most countries for women, patriarchy was still dominant and matriarchy vestigial. Even the political elite of those societies still did not accept or appreciate women's participation in public life. A Roman senator Cato, said, Our ancestors did not allow women to handle any business even domestic, without special authorization. …

Africa: Beyond the "new" dependency: A political economy

Abstract: Scholars seek to articulate plausible explanations for the current world situation where the vast majority of countries are underdeveloped while a relatively small portion- the Western countries, are rich. From the classical Marxist analysis emerged the neo-Marxists, encompassing the Third World scholars theorizing on the persistence of this division and development alternatives. Their central argument is ‘development of underdevelopment’ which forms the main strand of the dependency theory. However with the emergence of Brazil and China as global giants and the pervasive economic in-roads to Africa, a shift on Africa’s dependency on the global north seems inevitable. Is a “new dependency” emerging or is Africa developing and catching up to rise beyond a new dependency? This paper seeks to engage in the ongoing perennial debate on Africa’s dependency. It presents a critique of the dependency theory and argues that an inevitable economic growth of China will not only upturn the regional presence of America in Africa but will create a “new” relationship through Chinese soft technology-the new media and globalization. However the crux of the argument is whether this will in turn develop Africa or foster a new dependency within the global South. To interrogate these assumptions, this paper adopts international political economy (IPE) approach as a methodology to examine China/Africa relationship using post colonial tools of analysis. Key words: Dependency, development, globalization, underdevelopment, modernization, poverty, Africa.

Promising information: democracy, development, and the remapping of Latin America

Abstract: ‘Information' is an enormously promising, if ambiguous term in post-Cold War development thinking. In the last three decades, international development agencies have argued that Latin American land reform policy should focus not on redistributing land but on creating more information about land and making it as widely accessible as possible. These proposals, which I call ‘cadastral fixes' to rural underdevelopment, are understandably attractive and seem to fit well with democratic values of transparency and openness. But I argue that the use of the word ‘information' to connote both democratic rights and the apparatuses devised by economists to improve the rural economy is misleading. ‘Information' is productively vague, allowing development experts to change their projects in the face of failure without questioning the fundamental economic premises on which their reforms are built. As I show in this case study of Paraguayan cadastral reform, the history of these refinements shows a shift, under ...

Unequal Development In A Peripheral Capitalist State A Case Study Of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Province Of Pakistan (1947-1977)

Abstract: My thesis explores the problem of unequal development within the federation of Pakistan with reference to Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province from August 1947 to July 1977. In the development paradigm regionalism/provincialism is considered as a petty bourgeois phenomenon; my thesis refutes this viewpoint and considers the problematic of regionalism as inherent in capital logic. Maximization of profit engenders centralization of capital and concentration of resources thereby creating the dualism of core and periphery. The process of capital accumulation generates the contradiction of development and underdevelopment, Centre and periphery, core and hinterland. Development at the centre/core perpetuates underdevelopment in the periphery/hinterland. Poverty in the periphery is neither the poverty of natural resources nor the poverty of human resources; it is the enigma of capitalist growth. The problematic of core/periphery, centre/hinterland gains extra significance due to federal status of Pakistan where both the centre and the provinces derive power from the Constitution and neither one is subordinate to each other unlike a unitary state. My study however, unravels a different process, the State uses constitutional jurisdiction to legitimize power accumulation. In order to maintain hegemony over the civil society the state centralizes power, moreover this concentration of power is essential to fulfill accumulation and reproduction of capital as well. To do so the factors of production are mobilized to the areas with maximum return; as a consequence labour, capital and raw material from peripheral provinces is invested in the core regions. The state Legitimizes capital accumulation by concentrating political power in the centre through the Constitution, relegating the provinces to a subsidiary role. The second source of legitimation by the state is the academic and religious institutions as well as communication media (the ideological apparatuses). Besides the ideological institutions the state seeks support from the military, police, bureaucracy (repressive/coercive apparatuses) as well as landlords and bourgeoisie owning the means of production. Finally, hegemony is maintained by reorganizing the power bloc, hurting individual capitals in the process but protecting the total capital. My research is an holistic analysis of Unequal development in its historical, political and economic dimensions unraveling the Centre/Periphery problematic within the Federation of Pakistan with reference to Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province.

The Pacification of Soldiering, and the Militarization of Development: Contradictions Inherent in Provincial Reconstruction in Afghanistan

Abstract: Provincial reconstruction teams (PRTs) are a natural outgrowth of the security/development nexus and serve as an institutional response to a perceived need to listen to the new subjects of Northern security: the helpless Southern villager who is suffering from underdevelopment and insecurity. This article, through an analysis of primary interviews, oral histories of PRT workers, and official documents undertakes an examination of the different portrayals of PRTs by contributing states, militaries, the Afghani government, and most importantly, local communities. By exploring the contradictory representations of these new teams and the civil-military cooperation (CIMIC) officers that are at their heart, the logic behind these teams can be explored. This article draws on literatures on militarized masculinities to highlight the contestations over PRT identities to reveal the tensions around the conflation of security and development. In so doing, this article challenges assumptions of local communities as pa...

The Economic Roots of Political Underdevelopment in the Middle East: A Historical Perspective

Abstract: Key institutions of the pre-modern Middle Eastern economy, all grounded in Islamic law, blocked the development of democratic institutions. This talk identifies three mechanisms that played critical roles. Islam’s original tax system failed to produce lasting and credible constraints on governance. The waqfs (Islamic trusts) founded to provide social services to designated constituencies were politically powerless. Profit-making private enterprises remained small and ephemeral, hindering the formation of stable coalitions capable of bargaining with the state. The last two mechanisms jointly delayed the rise of a civil society able to provide the checks and balances essential to democratic rule.

The Needy Donor: An Empirical Analysis of India’s Aid Motives

Abstract: It is puzzling that India, which has a large domestic constituency of people suffering from underdevelopment, chronic poverty and mal-governance, is emerging as an important aid donor. With the intension of understanding why poor countries provide foreign aid, this article is the first to econometrically analyze India’s aid allocation decisions. First, we utilize cross-sectional data on aid commitments by the Ministry of External Affairs to 125 developing countries, obtained in US dollars from AidData for the 2008-2010 period. Second, we compare India’s aid allocation with that of other donors. Our findings show that India’s aid allocation is partially in line with our expectations of the behavior of a “needy” donor. Commercial and political self-interests dominate India’s aid allocation. We find the importance of political interests to be significantly larger for India than for all donors of the Development Assistance Committee. Moreover, we find that countries which are closer geographically are favored, and that countries at a similar developmental stage are more likely to enter India’s aid program.

Corruption in the Underdevelopment of the Niger Delta in Nigeria

Abstract: Introduction Since the discovery of crude oil in Nigeria, politics has been largely a scramble for petrodollars (Apter, 1998: 141). Drawing on a World Bank report, Afiekhena (2005: 15) estimates that, "about 80 per cent of Nigeria's oil and natural gas revenues accrue to one per cent of the country's population. The other 99 per cent of the population receive the remaining 20 per cent of the oil and gas revenues, leaving Nigeria with the lowest per capita oil export earning put at $212 per person in 2004." Worse still, most of the wealth that accrues to the one per cent of the Nigerians (the elites) who have ransacked the "national oil cake" ends up outside the country. As Afiekhena (2005: 15) again notes, "Nigeria had an estimated $107 billion of its private wealth held abroad." As a result, not only are most Nigerians excluded from the profits of the oil wealth, most of the wealth has not been invested within the country, contributing to most Nigerians living below the poverty line. Thus, Cyril Obi (2010: 443) has argued that oil is more of a curse than a blessing in Nigeria. Such a view is informed by the fact that oil wealth has tended to bleed away the pockets of public officials, warping a country's development and far too often leaving a people destitute. Nowhere is this more obtrusive than in the oil-rich Niger Delta region. Ordinarily, the Niger Delta region should be a vast economic reservoir of national and international import. Its rich endowments of crude oil and natural gas resources feed methodically into the international economic system, in exchange for massive revenues that hold the promise of rapid socio-economic transformation. Unfortunately, the Niger Delta region remains arguably the poorest and least developed area in Nigeria (Omotola, 2006: 4; cf. Jike, 2004: 686-701; Ibeanu, 2000). The region is home to deep ironies. Life expectancy is falling in an age of blockbuster oil prices. Energy availability is epileptic in a region that provides one-fifth of the energy needs of the United States. The Niger delta needs to import fuel despite producing over two million barrels of crude oil per day! There is an almost total lack of paved roads in a region whose wealth is funding huge infrastructural development in other parts of Nigeria and expensive peacekeeping activities in other parts of Africa (UNDP, 2006: 151-159). For many inhabitants of the Niger Delta region, progress and hope, much less prosperity, remain effectively out of reach. Conflict theories have shown that when a cultural group's shared grievances about unfair treatment are combined with a strong sense of group identity, there is a tendency for the outbreak of violent responses against the source of their deprivation, either real or imagined (Omotola, 2006; Gurr, 1994: 347-377; Osaghae, 2005: 100-119). Thus, on account of the deepening contradictions in the Niger Delta, "there has been a growing wave of mobilization and opposition by ethnic minority groups against their perceived marginalisation, exploitation and subjugation in the Nigerian Federation" (Suberu, 1996: 2). Any peaceful protest by the people and popular movements is often met with the leviathan of official violence and repression. This became acute under military rule. As Ken Saro-Wiwa (1996: 43) commented during his fathom trial by the Abacha junta: "The Nigerian military dictatorship survives on the practice of violence and the control of the means of violence." While repression can silence or curtail group action, it has the net effect of radicalizing movement action, "as violence under this condition becomes the easiest of all options available for use by disadvantaged group because it does not have a high threshold of social transaction costs in terms of preparation and is also easier for isolated, illiterate and local groups to imitate" (Osaghae et al 2007: 6). Given the above, the paper is predicated on the thesis that corruption breeds underdevelopment and political instability in the Niger Delta. …

Public Debt and the Crisis of Development in Nigeria Econometric Investigation

Abstract: The study examined the extent of public debt crisis and its consequences on economic development using data from Nigerian economy for the period 1970 to 2010. It employed the error correction framework and co-integration techniques to test the relationship between per-capita gross domestic product and macroeconomics variables. The test reveals that there is long relationship between dependent and the independent variables. This implies that political instability may reduce rate development and other independent variables are responsible for the underdevelopment of Nigeria. Hence, to avoid the crisis of economic development in Nigeria public debt should be reduce to a minimal level.

Challenges of Economic Growth, Poverty and Development: Why Are the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) not Fair to Sub-Saharan Africa?

Abstract: Sub-Saharan African countries report high levels of growth and GDP per capita and yet they are unable to achieve the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) such as quality education and health. The paper argued that GDP might not be sufficient for measuring development because the funds obtained may not necessarily be used to improve the quality of life of worse off communities. Even with a constituent level of GDP, the problem of poverty and underdevelopment is becoming more intractable in Sub-Saharan Africa. This paper focused on the Challenges facing Sub-Saharan African countries in achieving the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs). This was discussed after revealing growth in GDP and inequality trends in Sub-Saharan Africa. Using examples from countries like Nigeria, it is evident that many countries in Sub-Saharan Africa are unlikely to achieve their MDG targets due to persistence of poverty and other challenges such as corruption and mal-administration of funds. Moreover, the required growth to substantially reduce poverty is too high by international standards. The paper concluded by concurring with the view that redistribution of the growth increment of income is more likely to be effective in reducing poverty than growth in GDP alone. Therefore while growth in GDP may be prone to poverty reduction, it should be complemented with policies to ensure investment and broad participation, reduce violence, root out corruption and increase investment in infrastructure. The paper recommends that countries’ development strategies must take into consideration national realities in each country rather than adopting targets and policies from the western world.

“Memories of Underdevelopment” after Area Studies

Abstract: In this essay, I examine how the “desire” called “area studies”1 was founded on the privilege attached to xed spatial containers, such as geographic area, culture region, or directional locality (East Asia, Southeast Asia, Northeast Asia). The model for these spatial regularities has undoubtedly been the nationstate — itself a spatial gure — and its capacity for modernizing makeovers. These have led to the formation of rationalities such as the liberaldemocratic state, capital accumulation, and the primacy of the “selfregulating market,” which have come to collectively signify an unchanging modern structure. Even the transmutation of area studies into its most recent avatar — identity studies, which presumes permanent ethnocultural determinations — persists in privileging the spatial over the force and forms of time. This “end of tem-

International migration and social policy underdevelopment in the Dominican Republic

Abstract: Based on the Dominican Republic’s economic and political institutional characteristics, we would expect social spending there to be at least average for Latin America. Yet in reality this country ranks at or near the bottom of the region in educational, health, pension and overall social spending, alongside significantly poorer, slower growing and less democratic countries. This article argues that the underdevelopment of Dominican social policies reflects the political impact of international migration flows, including both Dominican emigration to the United States and the immigration into the Dominican Republic from neighboring Haiti. These flows have inhibited the development of progressive political actors, including the partisan left and organized labor, and facilitated the adoption of an economic production model that erects additional obstacles to the expansion of the country’s social policies. Although the Dominican case is rather anomalous within Latin America, it holds important implications for...