Harrison highlights some key principals that further development and also show it is a good thing (Harrison, 1998: 237-8). First of all the idea of human equality—as opposed to authoritarianism—which constricts the growth of individuals and societies because people are forced to conform. Also important is a sense of common identity with others—this extends beyond the family to form a community which can then encourage economic and social development, and cooperation between all parties, not just within the family is increased. The problem with this is these values are essentially western—for example the strong family ties cannot just be done away with—it cannot just be a case of doing away with the old way of doing things and importing these values—however important they may seem to us.
There is serious doubt about the good intentions of development—Marxist thought sees that the industrialised countries have exploited the low-income countries, and in the end development is a zero sum game—the rich remain rich and the poor remain poor. And what they put into development is more than balance by ‘counter development’ where very cheap raw materials and labour are used by the developers (2).
Development is often linked to modernisation—the transformation of traditional societies into modern ones. This is characterised by advanced technology, material prosperity and political stability. Although this development has good intentions it is leading to an erosion of culture, and importation of western values and techniques and gives an impression of ‘west is best’. The knowledge and culture of the developed is often ignored or treated as an obstacle to development. This ignorance, and failure to try and understand the home culture means that when development happens it is not well accepted.
There are several difficulties in the development process that further hinder its usefulness. Most projects fall seriously short of the goals they set out to achieve. For example, in the drought prone Sahel region in Africa, for every five thousand hectares brought under irrigation, the same area of land is turning into salty desert because of poor drainage (Hobart, 1995: 3)—it’s not improving the situation. Furthermore, in Timor, Indonesia six large dams were built to bring water to arid regions (the country only sees three months of rain, the rest of the time it is dry). But these dams were so positioned that there was no-one within miles—again seeming a rather pointless project (Hobart, 1995: 3)s. Yet these dams were positioned by a road meaning that if people did migrate from the far off regions, the government would be able to keep a much better eye on them. Government interests—keeping their people tied down—are often at the centre of development projects and, as in this case, can deride their effectiveness.
Another difficulty is that developers are often given very little time for research and even for projects themselves. They are then forced to work with pre-established guidelines and hope the case fits the mould. This can lead to serious problems—such as those seen in the Timor dam project. It is a general rule that piping should not cost more than one per cent of the total cost of the dam—but in this case, because of the location of the dams, it left taps in the middle of no-where serving no purpose (Hobart, 1995: 9).
There are also big difficulties with communication—because of both language and cultural gaps between the developers and the developed. The time that developers spend on the field—usually under two years, is too short for them to be able to master the language and establish a close relationship where there is no suspicion of their intentions or what they are doing. However, developers are faced with a dilemma here because if they do manage to establish close relations with the peasant population, it does reduce the control that they have over them. Dr Riches highlights that for development to be successful, it requires both good control and friendly relations (lecture 27/10/03)—development is a very difficult issue.
The example of Richard Burghart highlights the difficulties in differences in culture
The difficulties in differences in culture, mentioned briefly above, are furthered when we look at the case of the Inuit. Government development projects led to the creation of a cooperative, where the Inuit could buy and sell things such as guns and fur. This system of credit and debit, where no actual money was exchanged worked well when the development officer was in charge but when he left it was not used in the capitalistic way that it was intended—but was run by peasant rules. Whereas the development officer had been able to run the coop shop with authority—which the young women who took his place did not have. They should have had the power to refuse the purchase of items if the customer could not afford it—but because young women lack authority in Inuit culture, they were unable to uphold their position—this obviously led to financial problems. Then on top of this expensive items were not sold in the shop but by elected leaders—who would set the prices and payments. These should be at a level such that that shop would make a profit. However, the make up of peasant society meant that ordinary people have control over leaders—and those who received the expensive items such as snowmobiles were not the rich but those closely related to the leadership. They persuade leaders to lower the price of retail goods and raise prices for goods sold to the coop. The outcome was that the coop fell into severe debt and within a year the development had to return to the community (lecture 30/10/03).
At the heart of development is a desire to see life improve.