While the possibility of producing a de-colonized, postcolonial knowledge in development studies became a subject of considerable debate in the 1990s, there has been little dialogue between postcolonialism and development. However, the need for development studies that is postcolonial in theory and practice is now increasingly acknowledged. This means recognizing the significance of language and representation, the power of development discourse and its material effects on the lives of people subject to development policies. It also means acknowledging the already postcolonial world of development in which contemporary reworkings of theory and practice, such as grassroots and participatory development, indigenous knowledge and global resistance movements, inform postcolonial theory. Postcolonialism and Development explains, reviews and critically evaluates recent debates about postcolonial approaches and their implications for development studies. By outlining contemporary theoretical debates and examining their implications for how the developing world is thought about, written about and engaged with in policy terms, this book unpacks the difficult, complex and important aspects of the relationship between postcolonial approaches and development studies, making them accessible, interesting and relevant to both students and researchers. Each chapter builds an understanding of postcolonial approaches, their historical divergences from development studies and more recent convergences around issues such as discourses of development, knowledge, and power and agency within development. Up-to-date illustrations and examples from across the regions of the world bring to life important theoretical and conceptual issues. This topical book outlines an agenda for theory and practice within postcolonial development studies and illustrates how, while postcolonialism and development pose significant mutual challenges, both are potentially enriched by each others insights and approaches.

Postcolonialism, Decoloniality and Development is a comprehensive revision of Postcolonialism and Development (2009) that explains, reviews and critically evaluates recent debates about postcolonial and decolonial approaches and their implications for development studies. By outlining contemporary theoretical debates and examining their implications for how the developing world is thought about, written about and engaged with in policy terms, this book unpacks the difficult, complex and important aspects of the relationships between postcolonial theory, decoloniality and development studies. The book focuses on the importance of development discourses, the relationship between development knowledge and power, and agency within development. It includes significant new material exploring the significance of postcolonial approaches to understanding development in the context of rapid global change and the dissonances and interconnections between postcolonial theory and decolonial politics. It includes a new chapter on postcolonial theory, development and the Anthropocene that considers the challenges posed by the current global environmental crisis to both postcolonial theory and ideas of development. The book sets out an original and timely agenda for exploring the intersections between postcolonialism, decolonialism and development and provides an outline for a coherent and reinvigorated project of postcolonial development studies. Engaging with new and emerging debates in the fields of postcolonialism and development, and illustrating these through current issues, the book continues to set agendas for diverse scholars working in the fields of development studies, geography, anthropology, politics, cultural studies and history.

In this comparative-historical analysis of Spanish America, Mahoney offers a new theory of colonialism and postcolonial development. He explores why certain kinds of societies are subject to certain kinds of colonialism and why these forms of colonialism give rise to countries with differing levels of economic prosperity and social well-being. Mahoney contends that differences in the extent of colonialism are best explained by the potentially evolving fit between the institutions of the colonizing nation and those of the colonized society. Moreover, he shows how institutions forged under colonialism bring countries to relative levels of development that may prove remarkably enduring in the postcolonial period. The argument is sure to stir discussion and debate, both among experts on Spanish America who believe that development is not tightly bound by the colonial past, and among scholars of colonialism who suggest that the institutional identity of the colonizing nation is of little consequence.

This book provides a valuable and unique introductory text that explains, reviews and critically evaluates recent debates about postcolonial approaches and their implications for development studies

This book uses a postcolonial lens to question development’s dominant cultural representations and institutional practices, investigating the possibilities for a transformatory postcolonial politics. Ilan Kapoor examines recent development policy initiatives in such areas as ‘governance,’ ‘human rights’ and ‘participation’ to better understand and contest the production of knowledge in development - its cultural assumptions, power implications, and hegemonic politics. The volume shows how development practitioners and westernized elites/intellectuals are often complicit in this neo-colonial knowledge production. Noble gestures such as giving foreign aid or promoting participation and democracy frequently mask their institutional biases and economic and geopolitical interests, while silencing the subaltern (marginalized groups), on whose behalf they purportedly work. In response, the book argues for a radical ethical and political self-reflexivity that is vigilant to our reproduction of neo-colonialisms and amenable to public contestation of development priorities. It also underlines subaltern political strategies that can (and do) lead to greater democratic dialogue.

This open access edited volume offers an analysis of the entangled histories of education and development in twentieth-century Africa. It deals with the plurality of actors that competed and collaborated to formulate educational and developmental paradigms and projects: debating their utility and purpose, pondering their necessity and risk, and evaluating their intended and unintended consequences in colonial and postcolonial moments. Since the late nineteenth century, the “educability” of the native was the subject of several debates and experiments: numerous voices, arguments, and agendas emerged, involving multiple institutions and experts, governmental and non-governmental, religious and laic, operating from the corridors of international organizations to the towns and rural villages of Africa. This plurality of expressions of political, social, cultural, and economic imagination of education and development is at the core of this collective work.

This seminal work—now available in a 15th anniversary edition with a new preface—is a thorough introduction to the historical and theoretical origins of postcolonial theory. Provides a clearly written and wide-ranging account of postcolonialism, empire, imperialism, and colonialism, written by one of the leading scholars on the topic Details the history of anti-colonial movements and their leaders around the world, from Europe and Latin America to Africa and Asia Analyzes the ways in which freedom struggles contributed to postcolonial discourse by producing fundamental ideas about the relationship between non-western and western societies and cultures Offers an engaging yet accessible style that will appeal to scholars as well as introductory students