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Why We Lie About Aid

“Why We Lie About Aid” (2018) appeared all over development studies social media in 2018, at one point topping Amazon’s best seller list for the sub-category. For those who do not think aid is political, or who sit on the fence of development being political, Pablo Yanguas’ book is an essential read. The book makes […]

Thought Provokers

Civil Society: Challenging Western Models

Edited volumes seems to have a shorter shelf life than books, similar to academic articles. I recently picked up the somewhat dated (1996) edited volume of “Civil Society: Challenging Western Models”, edited by Chris Hann and Elizabeth Dunn, to see what it might offer. It was written at a time when literature on civil society […]

Thought Provokers

How One Small Tow Banned Pesticides

Philip Ackerman-Leist’s “A Precautionary Tale: How One Small Town Banned Pesticides, Preserved its Food Heritage, and Inspired a Movement” (2017) takes a deep dive into one northern Italian town wherein farmers became activists and voted to ban pesticides. The book is a bit heavy on the storytelling, but it does not claim to be academic […]

Thought Provokers

Call for Submissions: Chapters in “Ethiopia: Social, Economic and Political Issues”

Call for Submissions: Book Chapters in “Ethiopia: Social, Economic and Political Issues” There have been significant social, economic and political changes in in Ethiopia in recent decades. Healthcare coverage has rapidly expanded but much progress is still needed; access to education has improved but there are questions of quality and employment; macro-economic growth has been […]

Research

Organizing Women Workers in the Informal Economy

Naila Kabeer, Ratna Sudarshan and Kirsty Milward edited “Organizing Women Workers in the Informal Economy: Beyond the Weapons of the Weak” (2013), which presents a series of cases from around the world. The book “shifts the analytical focus from individual women engaged in these informal forms of work to organizations that have set out to […]

Thought Provokers

New Publication: Enabling Collaborative Synthesis in Multi-Partner Programmes

Cochrane, L. and Cundill, G. (2018) Enabling Collaborative Synthesis in Multi-Partner Programmes. Development in Practice. DOI: 10.1080/09614524.2018.1480706 Abstract: Multi-partner consortia have emerged as an important modality for knowledge generation to address complex sustainability challenges. Establishing effective multi-partner consortia involves significant investment. This article shares lessons from the Collaborative Adaptation Research Initiative in Africa and Asia (CARIAA), […]

Research

Introducing Liberation Theology

Over the last decades, one of the sources of inspiration for new thinking in development practice has been liberation theology. Dr. Paul Farmer has utilized the ideas (in a less overtly religious form) and conveyed them to a broader audience, as the preferential option for the poor. What is liberation theology? Leonardo Boff and Clodovis […]

Thought Provokers

(Still) Challenging Received Wisdom on the African Environment

In the 80s and 90s an emerging set of research began to highlight that much of what we thought we knew about the environment in Africa, was, at best, only partially accurate. This had implications for policy and programs – and in some instances these narratives are still present. “The Lie of the Land: Challenging […]

Thought Provokers

A Socialist Peace? Explaining the Absence of War

Recently published as: Cochrane, L. (2018) Review: A Socialist Peace? Explaining the Absence of War in an African Country. Progress in Development Studies 18(3): 214-215. McGovern, Mike. 2017. A Socialist Peace? Explaining the Absence of War in an African Country. Chicago: University of Chicago Press. 249 pp. $ 30.00 (paper). ISBN: 9780226453606 Many studies have […]

Thought Provokers

The Origins of Political Order

Francis Fukuyama’s “The Origins of Political Order” (2011) is already standard reading, and should be read by all students of development studies. For those unfamiliar with the work, it focuses on the development of government institutions. This post picks up on a few points that resonated on a recent reading: The background: “Political institutions develop, […]

Thought Provokers