The Power of Positive Deviance

In 2010 Pascale, Sternin and Sternin published “The Power of Positive Deviance: How Unlikely Innovators Solve the World’s Toughest Problems”, published by Harvard Business Review. I am not sure how this book landed on my desk, but takes an outlier sampling approach to be utilized in a self-driven learning context for social change (and in […]

Tags: #Outliers #Positive Deviance #Social Change #Social systems #Sternin

Travesty in Haiti

I cannot recall where or how I was directed to “Travesty in Haiti: A True Account of Christian Missions, Orphanages, Food Aid, Fraud and Drug Trafficking” (2008) by Timothy Schwartz. The book appears to be self-published, and Paul Farmer is quoted on the back as saying “This book knocks it out of the park” (assuming […]

Tags: #Aid #Corruption #Haiti #ODA #Travesty in Haiti

Fields of Gold

Focusing on two country studies of the USA and Brazil, Madeleine Fairbairn’s “Fields of Gold: Financing the Global Land Rush” (2020) explores the financial side of the global rush for land. This book provides unique perspectives on a widely written about topic (often under the land grab or large-scale land acquisition frame, I’ve also used […]

Tags: #Field of Gold #Finance #Land grab #Land rush #Madeleine Fairbairn

The Horn of Africa

One of the Horn of Africa’s long-time scholars, Christopher Clapham, wrote “The Horn of Africa: State Formation and Decay” (2017), with Oxford University Press. A lot of the book, expectedly, focuses on Ethiopia. And, unfortunately for Clapham, the world of Ethiopia and the Horn has changed dramatically since. The book is accessible, which is often […]

Tags: #Clapham #Ethiopia #Horn of Africa #Somalia #Somaliland

A Radical History of Development Studies

In 2005 Uma Kothari published an edited book, “A Radical History of Development Studies: Individuals, Institutions and Ideologies”. The ten chapters of the book are clustered in two broad areas (individuals and ideas as well as ideas and ideologies). That two decades have past is quite evident in this text, what was pushing the edge […]

Lomathinda

In 2023 I reviewed a series of short books by Ohio University Press. Looking to expand beyond the well known biographies, I came across “Lomathinda: Rose Chibambo Speaks” (2019), by Timwa Lipenga, which is an interview-style book. The text chronologically outlines the personal and political struggles of one of Malawi’s leaders. A few notes: “That’s how politics of women started. […]