Post-Development from the Global South Radical Alternatives or Ambivalent Engagements?

1. Introduction

Sally Matthews and Alba Castellsagué

PART I: AMBIVALENCE, NOSTALGIA, COMPLEXITY

2. In search of post-development alternatives: ubuntu and development in South Africa

Sally Matthews, Nhlanhla Mkhutle and Simphiwe Gongqa

3. ‘Hardware’ and ‘software’ bikas: Nepali notions on development and its alternatives

Alba Castellsagué and Injina Panthi

4. Development as nostalgia and reverie in Eastern Rwanda

Justin Dodd Mullikin

5. CAMPFIRE and the politics of ambivalence: attitudes towards development in Kanyemba, Zimbabwe

Neil Maheve

PART II: BUEN VIVIR, LIVING WELL AND WELLBEING

6. The vivir bien rhetoric and Afro-Bolivian women’s struggles for recognition and inclusive citizenship

Eija Ranta and Cecilia Zenteno Lawrence

7. Revisiting the indigeneity-modernity relationship: vivir bien in the Bolivian Highlands

María Fernanda Córdova Suxo 

8. ‘Money is a universal need’: exploring Indigenous peoples' engagement with externally-led development in the Peruvian Amazon

Léna Prouchet, Vanessa Alessandra Azañedo Gamarra, Jane Wills, Stefano Pascucci and Greg Molecke

PART III: ALTERNATIVES?

9. Economies of solidarity in Tehran: new commons and diverse economies on the margins?

Reihaneh Saremi, Hadi Darvishi, Somayeh Momeni and Aram Ziai

10. Ontology in action: ecocentrism as defence of place in Indigenous social movement practices, South Africa

Emile Kwa and Yves Van Leynseele

11. Ambivalent perspectives on degrowth and alternatives to development: exploring notions of kalamboan and ginhawa in Siquijor province, Philippines

Joseph Edward Alegado

12. Conclusion

Alba Castellsagué and Sally Matthews

Biography

Sally Matthews is an Associate Professor in the Department of Political and International Studies at Rhodes University, South Africa. She is interested in a rather eclectic range of topics – post-development theory, the politics of knowledge production on Africa, the role of NGOs in Africa, higher education transformation and decolonisation – which are all loosely related to the question of whether and how those who occupy positions of privilege can act in the interests of the marginalised and oppressed.

Alba Castellsagué is an Assistant Professor (Lecturer) in the Pedagogy Department at the University of Girona (UdG). She has teaching and research experience in the fields of education and international development, gender equality and migration studies.

"This book is a must-read exposé on the curious dance between post-development and the Global South. It depicts the question of theory for whom and for what purpose by examining how people engage with development and its alternatives in locations where dire circumstances like poverty, inequality, violence, and deprivation seem to warrant ‘more development’. The book offers highly recommended insights on how the notion of ambivalence is useful to a practical understanding of what (post)development means for people who encounter it daily."

Nathan Andrews, Associate Professor of Political Science, McMaster University, Canada.

"This rich empirical collection offers an urgent challenge to post-development, showing how ambivalence – not brute desire nor repression – characterise how people in the global South really feel about development. This is essential reading requiring critical development scholars and students to depart from romantic and often unintentionally colonising approaches to understanding development’s failures."

Samantha Balaton-Chrimes, Associate Professor of Politics, Deakin University, Australia.