International Development: Shaping the mosaic.
What is Development?
By Fonju Ndemesah
Acknowledging the fact that development as it is view today is a “western invention”, we wish to go beyond this static vision to trace the historical component that has always being neglected by many development thinkers. As Catherine Coquery-Vidrovitch (1988) says, “development is a historical process and, at the same time, an ideological project".
When a photographer, an architect or an anatomist talks of development, each scholar in each discipline can trace what his or her colleague meant by development. The case with the word “development” as social change today is more complex. Development has been regarded as creating a modern, industrialized and growing economy in poor countries (Adam Smith 1976, Schumpeter, 1934, Rostow,1960). What type of growth or which aspect of development should be put first in the scale of preference seems of less importance to the above mentioned scholars. It has also being characterized by the international responsibility for the world’s poor. Internationalization of social concerns such as rights to food, education, sustainable environment, freedom of movement, shelter, and women and children right.
Development tried to solve the basic needs of the poor. The 1991 UNDP development report talks of “human development”, that is development as the increase of individual capacities to choose. These are only “pseudo-definitions” to use the words of Gilbert Rist(1996). To fully understand the concepts of development we have to give it a historical depth.
Beyond the western prism
Development without any historical depth has pushed many development practitioners to believe the concept was born in the 19th century. Even when its origin has being taken far backward, a large section of humanity has been considered as passive agents, who did not contribute in the idea of development. For the above thinkers, the traditional way of living was not far from the instinctive ways of animals.
Despite the fact that some scholars like S. Latouche try to portray to us that development is a concept not present in “les civilisation non occidentals” (C.Coquery and al, 1988), We believe that man has always longed to improve his way of life since the creation of the world. Trying to confine development to the present day will be incorrect and very reductive.
Right from ancient times, the human race has always tried to transform for the better his/her living condition. The great influence produced by the ideas of “Hegel who divided the world into two kinds: historical peoples who had contributed to the development of mankind, and non historical peoples who had taken no part in the spiritual development of the world” (Ki Zerbo, 1981) has influence the writing of the history of other societies. Scholars such as Cheick Anta Diop, (1960), C. C-Vidrovitch(1974), Ki Zerbo, (1981, 1972) have shown that, contrary to the Hegelian assumption, Africans are not only objects but subject of history. By so doing, the positive change, progress or amelioration of the self and the collective has always been part of the “African mind” thus of humanity at large.
R. Leakey (in Ki Zerbo, 1981) well portrays this effort to transform by saying, “the earliest known fashioned tools date from between 2, if not 3, million years ago, found by the edges of former lakes and marshes close to the rift valley in northern Tanzania and Kenya”. C.Coquery (2003), for example, says “Africa was the cradle of the oldest civilization in the world”. Thus, trying to remove some areas and their contribution in bringing change will be losing a consistent part of the history of humanity. Just like the prehistoric Africans, the Greek were “so fertile in their meditation on human nature” (C. Coquery, 2003). The works of western philosophers such as Aristotle, Plato, Hume, and Descartes have greatly helped to influence and shape ideas of humanity. The industrial revolution and other technological findings are all means that have been put forward by man to ameliorate his condition. One cannot forget the great impact the Asian culture Buddhism, Hinduism in helping the Asians and the world at large to adapt to its environment and foster their living condition.
Even though present day vision of development is different and sometimes in contrast with what our ancestors really meant when they talked of development, trying to confine the concept of development to the west will be missing a consistent part of the “significant” given to the word by the different people who have in different time and different areas given their own contribution to the construction of the “development mosaic”. As C. Coquery (1988) succinctly puts it, the idea of development is far from being a privilege of present western countries. Development is “old”, “rich” and “diversified”.
Acknowledging the fact that development as it is view today is a “western invention”, we wish to go beyond this static vision to trace the historical component that has always being neglected by many development thinkers. As Catherine Coquery-Vidrovitch (1988) says, “development is a historical process and, at the same time, an ideological project".
When a photographer, an architect or an anatomist talks of development, each scholar in each discipline can trace what his or her colleague meant by development. The case with the word “development” as social change today is more complex. Development has been regarded as creating a modern, industrialized and growing economy in poor countries (Adam Smith 1976, Schumpeter, 1934, Rostow,1960). What type of growth or which aspect of development should be put first in the scale of preference seems of less importance to the above mentioned scholars. It has also being characterized by the international responsibility for the world’s poor. Internationalization of social concerns such as rights to food, education, sustainable environment, freedom of movement, shelter, and women and children right.
Development tried to solve the basic needs of the poor. The 1991 UNDP development report talks of “human development”, that is development as the increase of individual capacities to choose. These are only “pseudo-definitions” to use the words of Gilbert Rist(1996). To fully understand the concepts of development we have to give it a historical depth.
Beyond the western prism
Development without any historical depth has pushed many development practitioners to believe the concept was born in the 19th century. Even when its origin has being taken far backward, a large section of humanity has been considered as passive agents, who did not contribute in the idea of development. For the above thinkers, the traditional way of living was not far from the instinctive ways of animals.
Despite the fact that some scholars like S. Latouche try to portray to us that development is a concept not present in “les civilisation non occidentals” (C.Coquery and al, 1988), We believe that man has always longed to improve his way of life since the creation of the world. Trying to confine development to the present day will be incorrect and very reductive.
Right from ancient times, the human race has always tried to transform for the better his/her living condition. The great influence produced by the ideas of “Hegel who divided the world into two kinds: historical peoples who had contributed to the development of mankind, and non historical peoples who had taken no part in the spiritual development of the world” (Ki Zerbo, 1981) has influence the writing of the history of other societies. Scholars such as Cheick Anta Diop, (1960), C. C-Vidrovitch(1974), Ki Zerbo, (1981, 1972) have shown that, contrary to the Hegelian assumption, Africans are not only objects but subject of history. By so doing, the positive change, progress or amelioration of the self and the collective has always been part of the “African mind” thus of humanity at large.
R. Leakey (in Ki Zerbo, 1981) well portrays this effort to transform by saying, “the earliest known fashioned tools date from between 2, if not 3, million years ago, found by the edges of former lakes and marshes close to the rift valley in northern Tanzania and Kenya”. C.Coquery (2003), for example, says “Africa was the cradle of the oldest civilization in the world”. Thus, trying to remove some areas and their contribution in bringing change will be losing a consistent part of the history of humanity. Just like the prehistoric Africans, the Greek were “so fertile in their meditation on human nature” (C. Coquery, 2003). The works of western philosophers such as Aristotle, Plato, Hume, and Descartes have greatly helped to influence and shape ideas of humanity. The industrial revolution and other technological findings are all means that have been put forward by man to ameliorate his condition. One cannot forget the great impact the Asian culture Buddhism, Hinduism in helping the Asians and the world at large to adapt to its environment and foster their living condition.
Even though present day vision of development is different and sometimes in contrast with what our ancestors really meant when they talked of development, trying to confine the concept of development to the west will be missing a consistent part of the “significant” given to the word by the different people who have in different time and different areas given their own contribution to the construction of the “development mosaic”. As C. Coquery (1988) succinctly puts it, the idea of development is far from being a privilege of present western countries. Development is “old”, “rich” and “diversified”.