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Whose Reality Counts?
Twenty years ago Robert Chambers published “Whose Reality Counts? Putting the First Last” (1997). He challenges the academics and professionals to turn how they work upside down. His earlier book, Rural Development (1983) did similarly. In doing so, however, Chambers is not the angry dissident disowning ‘development’, rather he offers an optimistic vision: “That the […]
Reflections from Benedict Anderson
Benedict Anderson, author of the well-read “Imagined Communities” (1983), has authored a short autobiography / set of reflections called “A Life Beyond Boundaries” (2016). The book is an interesting read about his journey toward, and through, academia. The book was inspired by a request to share this experience with a Japanese audience, which was published in […]
How Migration Shaped Our World and Will Define Our Future
Open doors or build walls? Immigration is one of the most politicized issues. Thus, the value of the book by Goldin, Cameron and Balarajan (2011): “Exceptional People – How Migration Shaped Our World and Will Define Our Future”. Before delving into the detail, this book was likely written for an undergraduate audience – those moderately […]
How Migration Shaped Our World and Will Define Our Future
Open doors or build walls? Immigration is one of the most politicized issues. Thus, the value of the book by Goldin, Cameron and Balarajan (2011): “Exceptional People – How Migration Shaped Our World and Will Define Our Future”. Before delving into the detail, this book was likely written for an undergraduate audience – those moderately […]
Global Inequality
Inequality is headline news. Recently Oxfam reported that only 8 individuals own as much as the poorest half of the world’s population. In 2014, Piketty published a widely read book on the subject, taking a historical economics approach. But, this question is not new. Amin addressed it in his 1976 book “Unequal Development“, the greater […]
How Non-conformists Move the World
Some advice from Grant’s (2016) widely read “Originals: How Non-conformists Move the World” – at least those that may apply for researchers: Write a lot. Not because if you don’t publish you will perish, but because it makes your work better. “It is widely assumed that there’s a tradeoff between quality and quantity – if […]
Kicking Away the Ladder
Cambridge professor of development studies, Ha-Joon Chang, is likely more known is the ‘Global South’ than within universities in North America or Europe – mainly because his writing takes a different approach, sometimes rather boldly so. Of his long list of publications, “Kicking Away the Ladder: Development Strategy in Historical Perspective” (2002) is the most […]
Saving Capitalism: For the Many, Not the Few
Two of the prominent front runners of the US presidential election positions themselves as “anti-establishment” and campaigned to take away the power of the elites and return that power to the people. Reich’s recent book “Saving Capitalism: For the Many, Not the Few” (2015) took on many of the issues; essentially questions about democracy, power, […]
Orientalism
Few books have been as widely read and cited as Orientalism (1978) by Edward Said. Reading Orientalism now, it is hard to understand its importance because so many of Said’s ideas have become part of a broader cultural and post-colonial critiques. Despite its influence, in a 2003 Preface, the author writes: “The disheartening part is […]
Q-Squared
Random control trials and ethnographic studies use very different approaches to answer research questions. Often the underlying epistemological foundations differ, the means of measurement differ, and the process of understanding causation differ. But, does it matter? It one approach more accurate than another? Do qualitative and quantitative studies arrive at similar conclusions? These questions are […]
About me
Logan Cochrane
Associate Professor at HBKU in the College of Public Policy. He is an Associate Fellow of the Ethiopian Academy of Sciences and an Adjunct Professor at Hawassa University (Institute for Policy and Development Research). Over the last fifteen years, he has worked in Afghanistan, Benin, Burundi, Canada, the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Egypt, Ethiopia, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, South Africa, South Sudan, Tanzania and Uganda. Logan acts as a consultant for governmental agencies and non-governmental organizations, seeking to create bridges between research and practice.
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