Sneha Arora (02001972)

(10:30-11:30am)
Critical Global Theories: Assignment 4

To me, the three given scenarios are part of the same story, especially for “developing”
nations, towards a path of development (not necessarily linear), and in that sense, the third is the
most advanced, and the closest scenario to a developed society (in the way that I understand the
concept of development). For the purpose of these discussion notes, I am writing with the
assumption that the “way out”, towards development and putting an end to suffering, is being
taken by the people of the developing countries, while it may be applicable to the
impoverished/disenfranchised in the developed nations as well. The first scenario seems archaic,
I see it as having hints of the colonial justification of suffering as simply being a means to the
end of reaching “development” and being “civilized”. It is the most top-down approach out of
the three, and I cannot resonate with that as a solution for suffering or inequalities. The second
scenario/story is one that, I believe, we are currently living in, a combination of top-down and
bottom-up approaches. At first glance, this scenario does not seem too bad, and could even work,
but the dependence on the gratuity of governments, NGOs, international organization, or private
philanthropic agents, makes me doubt the sustainability of this plan in the long run. Moreover,
the “help is on the way” promise may simply be counter-productive in creating empowered
communities operating on the principles of sustainability. It is more of a top-down instruction
that may create the illusion of initiative by the people themselves, and does little to recognize or
take responsibility for the shortcomings in bridging enough gaps that all people would have the
capacity to “pull themselves up by their bootstraps”.
This is where the third scenario comes in, which I understand as being the most ideal, or,
for lack of a better word, the most advanced (maybe similar to the “sustainability project”?). It is
a bottom-up approach, and I think this is where the goals of developing nations should lie, in
creating an enabled (Foucault) and empowered population, which has the access to resources that
help in recognizing its entitlements, and the ability/possibility of demanding them and criticizing
institutions when they believe things are not going right. Internalized hierarchies and accepting
the status quo as the truth and only path to salvation is part of the problem (which is the case in
story 2), whereas people need to be able to perceive “something as not right”, and express it.
This power should lie with minorities and the majority alike, together having the collective
ability to shape their development through their voices/outrage. In this sense, we would need to
break-free out of the restricting economic paradigms of development, and look at it as more of an
anthropocentric process (with human rights and the environment in mind). Since we define
worldviews as looking at the “the world as an outcome of human activity”, this seems to be the
most intuitive path towards achieving true development and minimized inequalities and
suffering. Due to this reason, moreover, the Human Development Index might be a more
accurate way of measuring overall ‘development’ than a GDP, while it may not be a perfect
method either. Further, reading this third scenario, in a way, reminded me of the recent speeches
by Joe Biden and Kamala Harris, where they emphasized that the work does not end with
elections, but that democracy and development are a continuous and a collective project. Thus,
critique is the only way we can overcome the “blindspots” (McMichael) in the current
development theory, as it signifies a mobilized, informed, and an enabled population, that knows
what it needs to “progress”. It is also the most sustainable way, as the solutions would be ideally
be a series of trade-offs between contentious critiques with the maximum win-win situations.
Moreover, critique implies an active/participatory democracy/form of governance, which is vital
for people to realize their complete potential. A government that is able to create an environment
where people can realize their full potential, while allowing for criticism to shape governance,
would be the ideal government on the path towards development (similar to theory on “positive
peace” by Galtung, 1964). The bottom-line remains that real and meaningful change and
development cannot occur in silence. In this sense, cases of censorship in China, numerous
internet lockdowns in India, and protests being shut down by force in even “developed”
countries like the US, cannot be considered actions by developed nations. Economically, these
countries lie on very different stages of development, with the US being the perceived
frontrunner in the world, but in terms of critique and an informed/empowered population, this
status may become questionable.
This brings us to the question of modernization. Does development necessarily lead to
modernization? I believe that depends on how modernity is defined, and who is defining it.
Considering that this is a bottom-up approach, shaped by critique, modernity might not always
be an outcome of a phased, homogenizing, or globalizing process, as the modernization theory
that we studied states, and thus, it can’t have a universal definition/characteristics. Even the
concept of progress, as defined by this theory, can be debated, as the definition of “people will
become better in terms of quality of life (social progress) through economic development
(economic progress), and the application of science and technology (scientific progress)” fails to
factor in human welfare, rising inequalities, critique from the masses, or simply even human
agency. If modernity remains a standard (“development-centrism”) set by the “First World”
nations, then I don’t agree that it is entirely an objective and non-racist concept or goal, since it
ignores the diversity of cultures in the world that are seemingly incompatible with the Western
notions of prosperity and development. In fact, these cultures may actually have the potential to
grow organically, and through acknowledgement of continuous critique, to realize their own
developmental, and hence modernity, potential. Historically speaking, we have continuously
seen resistance from non-European cultures towards Western-dominated development
(dependency theory), which emphasizes the need for the concept of modernity to incorporate and
allow for prosperity within heterogeneity. Could it be that maybe there is no actual single
alternative to capitalism (spatial fixes acting as mere ‘bandaids’) and the current development
theory, despite all their flaws, simply because it is next to impossible to universalize a solution?