Encountering Development - Softcover

Escobar, Arturo

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0691001022 ISBN 13: 9780691001029

Publisher: Princeton University Press, 1994

Synopsis

How did the industrialized nations of North America and Europe come to be seen as the appropriate models for post-World War II societies in Asia, Africa, and Latin America? How did the postwar discourse on development actually create the so-called Third World? And what will happen when development ideology collapses? To answer these questions, Arturo Escobar shows how development policies became mechanisms of control that were just as pervasive and effective as their colonial counterparts. The development apparatus generated categories powerful enough to shape the thinking even of its occasional critics while poverty and hunger became widespread. "Development" was not even partially "deconstructed" until the 1980s, when new tools for analyzing the representation of social reality were applied to specific "Third World" cases. Here Escobar deploys these new techniques in a provocative analysis of development discourse and practice in general, concluding with a discussion of alternative visions for a postdevelopment era.

Escobar emphasizes the role of economists in development discourse--his case study of Colombia demonstrates that the economization of food resulted in ambitious plans, and more hunger. To depict the production of knowledge and power in other development fields, the author shows how peasants, women, and nature became objects of knowledge and targets of power under the "gaze of experts."

About this title

From the Back Cover

"An intelligent and thorough overview of the rise of the concept of 'development' . . . . [This book] represents the best of interdisciplinary work in cultural studies and speaks to central debates across the permeable borders of anthropology, economics, history, sociology, and development studies."--Orin Starn, Duke University

About the Author

Arturo Escobar is Associate Professor of Anthropology at the University of Massachusetts, Amherst. He recently taught at Smith College.

Edition details

• Publisher: Princeton University Press
• Publication date: 1994
• ISBN 10: 0691001022
• ISBN 13: 9780691001029
• Binding: Paperback
• Language: English
• Number of pages: 320