Logan Cochrane

Seeing Like A State – Describing Society

Thought provoking quotes from Scott’s (1998) Seeing Like A State: How Certain Schemes to Improve the Human Condition have Failed. On simplification: “… state simplifications, the basic givens of modern statecraft, were, I began to realize, rather like abridged maps. They did not successfully represent the actual activity of the society they depicted, nor were […]

Tags: #Describing Society #James C. Scott #Legibility #Seeing Like a State #Simplification

Creating Capabilities (Nussbaum, 2011)

The following quotes are taken from Nussbaum’s Creating Capabilities: The Human Development Approach, 2011. Largely building on Sen, and forging new paths for the capabilities approach, in this book Nussbaum attempts to summarize the approach for broader audiences, as it is often bogged down in weighty philosophical texts. On the Capabilities Approach: “The Capabilities Approach […]

Tags: #Capabilities Approach #Creating Capabilities #Human Development Approach #Nussbaum #Sen

U.S. Development as Foreign Policy in Ethiopia (McVety, 2012)

On US foreign aid: “In its most optimistic moments, the U.S. government truly believed that by doing good it could indeed do well. The problem is that foreign aid seems to have done more harm than it has good, which means that the United States has not done nearly as well as it hoped.” (p. […]

Tags: #Ethiopia #Expectations of Development #Foreign Aid #Foreign Policy #politics of famine

Practicing “Development” (Ferguson, 1990)

Following an earlier post on the construction of “development”, the following are thought provoking quotes from Ferguson’s (1990) The Anti-Politics Machine on the practice of “development”: Context: “The argument, in brief, is the following: “development” institutions generate their own form of discourse, and this discourse simultaneously constructs Lesotho as a particular kind of object of […]

Tags: #(a)political #Development #Ferguson #Practice of Development #Practicing Development

Constructing “Development” (Ferguson, 1990)

Quotes on the construction of “development” from Ferguson’s influential Anti-Politics Machine (1990): “The argument, in brief, is the following: “development” institutions generate their own form of discourse, and this discourse simultaneously constructs Lesotho as a particular kind of object of knowledge, and creates a structure of knowledge around that object. Interventions are then organized on […]

Tags: #Constructing Development #Development discourse #Framing Development #Politics of Development

Social Life of Disease – Smallpox

Pox: An American History (2011) by Willrich provides a wealth of interesting examples of the intersections between public health, epidemiology, society, culture and politics. The context: “All told, during the five-year wave of epidemics around the turn of the century, the federal service counted 164,283 American cases of smallpox. The actual number of cases may […]

Tags: #Smallpox #Social life of disease

The Rational Peasant (1979) Popkin

Popkin’s book offers ideas that, at least at times, directly confront those of James C. Scott (see quotes from one of his works here). This post continues the ‘thought provokers’ series of posts from The Rational Peasant (1979). On assumptions of peasant life: “Some representations of preindustrial society idealize life in peasant villages. These romantic […]

Tags: #Agency #Moral Economics #Myth of the Village #Peasant Studies #Political Economics

The Will to Improve (2007) Li

For anyone interested in international development, this is essential reading. The opening chapters of the book are academic, and I suspect this has contributed to it mostly being engaged with by academics. However, Li’s book is highly recommended for practitioners, even if that means skimming some parts. What follows is not a summary of The […]

Tags: #Complexity #Ethnography #Practice of Development #Rendering Technical #The Will to Improve

Development as Freedom (1999) Sen

Many of Sen’s contributions have become common knowledge and do not appear to be as groundbreaking as they once were. Nonetheless, what follows is a selection of thought provoking quotes from Development as Freedom: On freedom(s): “These include (1) political freedoms, (2) economic freedoms, (3) social opportunities, (4) transparency guarantees and (5) protective security. Each of […]

Revisiting Scott’s (1985) Weapons of the Weak

On ‘weapons of the weak’: “Here I have in mind the ordinary weapons of relatively powerless groups: foot dragging, dissimulation, false compliance, pilfering, feigned ignorance, slander, arson, sabotage and so forth. These Brechtian forms of class struggle have certain features in common. They require little or no coordination or planning; they often represent a form […]

Tags: #Capitalism #Creation of Custom #James C. Scott #Marxist Revolution #Weapons of the weak