This is
the ‘post-modern’ conceptualization of development (one might also refer to this as
the ‘post-development’, ‘post-colonial’ or ‘post-structuralist’ position – see Chapter 3
for a more detailed discussion).
This third perspective emerged as a reaction to the deliberate efforts at progress
made in the name of development since World War II and was triggered in particular
by the 1949 Declaration by the US President Truman that:
we must embark on a bold new program for making the benefi ts of our scientifi c
advances and industrial progress available for the improvement and growth of
underdeveloped areas. (cited in Esteva, 1992: 6)
The ‘post-modern’ approach is not so much a conceptualization of development as
a frontal onslaught onto the ‘development industry’ (including researchers, practitioners
and aid institutions). Box 1.1 summarizes the ‘post-modern’ view.
The ‘post-modern’ approach draws upon, amongst others, Michel Foucault (1966,
1969). The key element of this approach is that, for post-modernists, development
(and poverty) are social constructs that do not exist in an objective sense outside of
the discourse (a body of ideas, concepts and theory) and that one can only ‘know’
reality through discourse. In this approach there is no such thing as ‘objective
reality’. Such a ‘discourse’ approach might be said to: