GEO 705: Theories of Development
Wednesdays, 6:45-9:30pm
Eggers 155
Tom Perreault
529 Eggers Hall
443-9467
taperrea@maxwell.syr.edu
Office Hours: Tuesdays 2-3pm, Thursdays 11:00-12:00 noon
or by appointment
________________________________________________________________________________________
Course Overview
This course provides a critical overview of development theory. We will trace ideas of
development from the 19th century forward, with a particular emphasis on development
thinking in the post-World War II period. Our treatment of various theoretical approaches will
proceed chronologically, in an attempt to understand the ways that various ideas (particularly
from the political left and right) have responded to one another over time. As such, we will
read these various bodies of literature as a set of ongoing debates on issues of development.
Please note that this is a course on development theory. It is not a class on development policy,
nor is an applied course on development practice. You will not finish the semester with a ready
set of policy and practical tools. My hope is that you will come away from the class with a set of
critical, theoretical tools, which will enable you to analyze the processes, relationships and
phenomena involved in what we call ‘development.’ Our aim is to critically examine
development thinking and its evolution over time. With this in mind, you will have an
opportunity to apply these ideas in a more practical, problem-oriented way in your final
research paper, if you wish to do so.
Course Requirements
This course has a heavy reading load. Be prepared to spend several hours each week wading
through the literature. You are expected to do all assigned readings and come to class ready to
discuss them critically. Each week you will be expected to prepare a 1-2 page critical response
paper to the readings. Critical responses may present questions, rebuttals, syntheses of key ideas,
or critical analyses of themes in the week’s readings. Keep in mind that these should be critical in
nature, and not merely summaries of the key points in the week’s readings. You are allowed 2 ‘free
weeks’ when you don’t have to turn in a response. You can choose when to take these, according to
your schedule and stress level. So, by the end of the semester you will need to have turned in 9
critical responses to get full credit, of which 2 will be longer, graded papers (see below).
Twice during the semester you will be responsible for introducing the week’s readings. You may
sign up for the weeks you do this, according to your interests or personal schedule. In your
introduction, you will be expected to provide a critical summary of the week’s readings, and
introduce some points for class discussion. On these weeks you will also turn in longer (3-4 page)
critical response papers. These papers should more fully and critically synthesize the week’s
themes than your seven shorter response papers.
1
I will read all your critical responses and give you feedback, but I will not grade the seven shorter
papers – I don’t want you to worry about whether you’re writing what you think I want to read.
Rather, I want this to be an opportunity for you to be creative and play with ideas, and to get some
feedback from me. I will grade your two longer response papers, however, which will be worth 20
points each.
All your response papers, regardless of whether I grade them or not, should be thoughtful, well
written and free of mechanical errors. Papers of rough draft quality will not be accepted. No late
papers will be accepted unless prior arrangements are made.
Two-thirds of your grade will be based on a final paper of roughly 7000 words (around 24 pages of
text, double spaced). This should be a polished final draft, free of spelling and mechanical errors.
Papers of rough draft quality will not be accepted. Your paper must be fully cited and include a
detailed bibliography. You may use any citation system you like (footnotes, in-text citation, etc.), as
long as it is comprehensive and consistent. You may write your paper on any topic you choose,
based on themes covered in the class. Whatever the topic of your paper, I do expect you critically
to address questions in development theory. If you prefer, you may use this assignment to write a
research proposal, literature review essay, or a chapter draft for a thesis or dissertation. Regardless
of the direction your paper takes, you are required to submit a paper proposal of 2-3 pages,
detailing (1) the research problem you will examine in the paper, and (2) the research questions you
will address. Your proposal should also include a short, preliminary bibliography (of about 8-10
sources) of key works relevant to your topic. The proposal is on November 4, and final papers are
due on Friday, December 11 by 4:00 pm (they must be in my mailbox in the Geography
Department office, 144 Eggers Hall, by no later than 4:00 pm). Do not email papers to me. Unless
prior arrangements are made, late papers will be marked down one letter grade for every day they
are late. Please do not ask for extensions. You have all semester to work on this paper, and I will
have no patience with last-minute appeals.
Required Texts:
•
Escobar, Arturo 1995. Encountering Development. Princeton University Press.
•
Goldman, Michael 2005. Imperial Nature: The World Bank and Struggles for Social Justice in
the Age of Globalization. Yale University Press.
•
Li, Tania Murray 2007. The Will to Improve: Governmentality, Development and the Practice
of Politics. Duke University Press.
•
Peet, Richard with Elaine Hartwick 2009.
Theories of Development: Contentions,
Arguments, Alternatives (2nd edition). New York: Guilford.
Additional readings will be available via Blackboard.
2
Grading:
There are 200 points possible in this class, which will be divided as follows: final paper (100
points), class participation (60 points), and two long response papers (20 points each). Your
participation grade will be based on your seven short critical response papers and your
participation in class discussion. You need to turn in a total of seven short and two long
response papers during the course of the semester, and you need to participation to some
degree in every discussion. Reading is essential, and must form the basis of your participation.
To Recap:
Final paper
Long response papers (2 x 20)
Class participation (7 short response papers + discussion)
TOTAL
100 points
40 points
60 points
________________
200 points
Cell Phones and Laptops:
Please be sure that your cell phones are silenced before coming to class. Text messaging during
class will not be tolerated. Use of laptops for any purpose other than note taking is not
acceptable. This is common sense and common courtesy. Persons using electronic devices
inappropriately during class will be asked to leave.
3
Course Schedule
Date
Topic
_____ Readings__
__________
Sept 2
Course introduction:
What are we talking about when we talk about ‘development?’
_________________
Part I:
Theories of Development and the Capitalist World System
_________________
Sept 9
Theorizing Development
Peet and Hartwick: ch 1-2
Cowen and Shenton
Escobar: Intro, ch. 1
Larrain (Intro)
Glassman and Samatar
Pigg
_________________
Sept 16
Modernization Theory
Peet and Hartwick: ch 4
Hoselitz
Rostow
Huntington
Rist, ch. 6
_________________
Sept 23
Dependency Theory
and structuralist approaches
Peet and Hartwick: ch 5
Kay
Frank 1966, 1967
Cardoso
Larrain
_________________
Sept 30
The Marxist ‘Impasse’ and
post-dependency: actor-oriented
approaches, livelihoods,
and social capital
Booth 1985, 1993
Corbridge
Chambers
Fox
Bebbington 1999
Bebbington & Perreault 1999
_________________
Oct 7
Neoliberalism, the IMF
and structural adjustment
Peet and Hartwick: ch 3
Harvey
Stiglitz
Mohan et al.
Perreault and Martin
4
Date
Topic
_____ Readings__
__________
Part II:
Topics and Trends in Development
_________________
Oct 14
Sustainable development
WCED
World Bank
Redclift
Sneddon
Perreault 2009
Rist, ch. 10
_________________
Oct 21
Poststructuralism and
‘Anti-development’
Blaikie
Peet and Hartwick: ch 6
Escobar, ch 2-6
Lehmann 1997
_________________
Oct 28
Feminist critiques and
‘Gender and Development’
Peet and Hartwick: ch 7
Moser
Jaquette and Staudt
Prugl and Lustgarten
Chant
_________________
Nov 4
Ethnodevelopment
Laurie et al. 2005
Radcliffe and Laurie
Bebbington 2000
Perreault
Paper proposals due this week
_________________
Nov 11
The World Bank and green governance
Goldman
_________________
Nov 18
Development as governmentality
Li
_________________
Nov 25
Thanksgiving Holiday – No class this week
5
Date
Topic
Dec 2
Wrap up discussion
and student presentations
_____ Readings__
__________
no new readings
_________________
Dec 9
Student presentations
no new readings
_________________
Final papers due Friday, December 11, 4:00pm
Bibliography
Bebbington, Anthony 1999. Capitals and capabilities: a framework for analyzing rural
livelihoods and poverty alleviation. World Development, 27(12): 2021-2044.
Bebbington, Anthony, 2000 Re-encountering development: livelihood transitions and place
transformations in the Andes. Annals of the Association of American Geographers, 90(3):
495-520.
Bebbington, Anthony and Thomas Perreault 1999. Social capital, development and access to
resource in highland Ecuador. Economic Geography, 75(4): 395-418.
Blaikie, Piers 2000. Development, post-, anti-, and populist: a critical review. Environment and
Planning A, 32: 1033-1050.
Booth, David 1985. Marxism and development sociology: interpreting the impasse. World
Development, 13(7): 761-787.
Booth, David 1993. Development research: from impasse to a new agenda. In Frans J.
Schuurman (ed.), Beyond the Impasse: New Directions in Development Theory. London:
Zed Books, pp. 49-76.
Cardoso, Fernando Henrique 1972. Dependency and development in Latin America. New Left
Review, 74 (July/August).
Chambers, Robert 1983. Rural Development: Putting the Last First. New York: Longman
Scientific and Technical.
Chambers, Robert 1997. Whose Reality Counts? Putting the Last First. London: Intermediate
Technology Publications.
Chant, Sylvia 2006. Contributions of a gender perspective to the analysis of poverty. In Jane S.
Jaquette and Gale Summerfield (eds.), Women and Gender Equity in Development Theory
and Practice. Duke University Press, pp. 87-106.
Corbridge, Stuart 1994. Post-Marxism and post-colonialism: the needs and rights of distant
strangers. In David Booth (ed.) Rethinking Social Development: Theory, Research and
Practice. Essex: Longman, pp. 90-117.
6
Cowen, M.P. and R.W. Shenton 1996. Doctrines of Development. London: Routledge.
Escobar, Arturo 1995. Encountering Development. Princeton: Princeton University Press.
Fine, Ben 1999. The developmental state is dead – long live social capital? Development and
Change, 30: 1-19.
Fox, Jonathan 1996. How does civil society thicken? The political construction of social capital
in rural Mexico. World Development, 24(6): 1089-1103.
Frank, Andre Gunder 1966. The development of underdevelopmen. Monthly Review,
September.
Frank, Andre Gunder 1967. Capitalism and Underdevelopment in Latin America: Historical
Studies of Chile and Brazil. New York: Monthly Review Press.
Glassman, Jim and Abdi Ismail Samatar 1997. Development geography and the third-world
state. Progress in Human Geography, 21(2): 164-198.
Goldman, Michael 2005. Imperial Nature: The World Bank and Struggles for Social Justice in
the Age of Globalization. New Haven: Yale University Press.
Harvey, David 2005. A Brief History of Neoliberalism. Oxford University Press.
Hoselitz, Bert F. 1952. Non-economic barriers to economic development. Economic
Development and Cultural Change, 1(1): 8-21.
Huntington, Samuel 1968. Political Order in Changing Societies New Haven: Yale University
Press.
Huntington, Samuel 1971. The change to change: Modernization, development and politics.
Comparative Politics, 3.
Jaquette, Jane S. and Kathleen Staudt 2006. Women, gender and development. In Jane S.
Jaquette and Gale Summerfield (eds.), Women and Gender Equity in Development Theory
and Practice. Duke University Press, pp. 17-52.
Kay, Cristóbal 1989. Latin American Theories of Development and Underdevelopment.
London: Routledge.
Larrain, Jorge 1989. Theories of Development: Capitalism, Colonialism and Dependency.
London: Polity Press.
Laurie, Nina, Robert Andolina and Sarah Radcliffe 2005. Ethnodevelopment: social movements,
creating experts and professionalizing indigenous knowledge in Ecuador. Antipode 2005,
37(3), 470-496.
Lehmann, David 1997. An opportunity lost: Escobar’s deconstruction of development. Journal
of Development Studies, 33(4): 568-578.
Li, Tania Murray 2007. The Will to Improve: Governmentality, Development and the Practice of
Politics. Duke University Press.
7
Mohan, Giles, Ed Brown, Bob Milward and Alfred B. Zack-Williams 2000. Structural
Adjustment: Theory, Practice and Impacts. London: Routledge.
Moser, Caroline O.N. 1993. Gender Planning and Development: Theory, Practice and Training.
London: Routledge.
Nagar, Richa 1998. The difference that gender makes. In Philip W. Porter and Eric S.
Sheppard, A World of Difference: Society, Nature, Devleopment. New York: Guilford.
Peet, Richard with Elaine Hartwick 1999. Theories of Development. New York: Guilford.
Perreault, Thomas 2003. “’A people with our own identity’: toward a cultural politics of
development in Ecuadorian Amazonia,” Environment and Planning D: Society and Space,
21(5): 583-606.
Perreault, Tom 2009. Environment and Development. In Companion to Environmental Geography,
Noel Castree, David Demeritt, Diana Liverman and Bruce Rhoads (eds.), Oxford: Blackwell,
pp.442-460.
Perreault, Thomas and Patricia Martin 2005. Geographies of neoliberalism in Latin America.
Environment and Planning A, 37: 191-201.
Pigg, Stacy Leigh 1992. Inventing social categories through place: Social representations and
development in Nepal. Comparative Studies in History and Society, 34(3): 491-513.
Prugl, Elisabeth and Audrey Lustgarten 2006. Mainstreaming gender in international
organizations. In Jane S. Jaquette and Gale Summerfield (eds.), Women and Gender Equity
in Development Theory and Practice. Duke University Press, pp. 53-70.
Radcliffe, Sarah and Nina Laurie 2006. Culture and development: taking culture seriously in
development for Andean indigenous people. Environment and Planning D: Society and
Space, 24: 231-348.
Redclift, Michael 2005. Sustainable development (1987-2005): An oxymoron comes of age.
Sustainable Development, 13: 212-227.
Rist, Gilbert 1997. The History of Development: From Western Origins to Global Faith.
London: Zed Books.
Rostow, Walt Whitman 1960. The Economic Stages of Growth: A Non-Communist Manifesto.
Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Sneddon, Christopher S. 2000. ‘Sustainability’ in ecological economics, ecology and livelihoods:
a review. Progress in Human Geography, 24(4): 521-549.
Stiglitz, Joseph E. 2003. Globalization and its Discontents. New York: Norton.
World Commission on Environment and Development 1987. Our Common Future. Oxford
University Press.
World Bank 1992. Development and the Environment. World Development Report 1992.
Washington DC: The World Bank.
8