Tag Archives development dialogue

Le ONG europee si adattano ancora al registro dei loro interlocutori – ma ci sono segnali di cambiamento

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Pensando all’Unione Europea (UE), si tende ad immaginare un corpo unico che parla con una sola voce. Una percezione simile vale anche per le ONG europee, ma uno studio recente mostra che nell’ultimo decennio diversi quadri teorici, perlopiù riformisti, hanno ispirato la visione ed i discorsi delle ONG riguardo allo sviluppo. Questo articolo esplora cosa significhi tale riformismo per le ONG, mostrando che un’agenda di sviluppo più radicale, che si distanzi dal modello di crescita economica e dal retaggio coloniale dell’Europa, stia potenzialmente emergendo, anche se le discussioni a riguardo avvengono ancora prevalentemente internamente.

Create allo scopo di cooperare per lo ‘sviluppo’ e la ‘giustizia sociale’ nei paesi del Sud globale, le Organizzazioni Non Governative (Internazionali) (ONGI) operanti su tematiche legate allo sviluppo hanno prospettive e discorsi specifici su temi globali, che influenzano le loro attività di lobbying e advocacy a vari livelli decisionali. Tali discorsi, radicati in specifiche teorie di sviluppo, possono successivamente influenzare le politiche. Ciò motiva un’analisi critica dei discorsi e delle teorie sulle quali questi ultimi si basano.

Nella mia ricerca dottorale in corso, analizzo il discorso generale sullo ‘sviluppo’ proposto da CONCORD, che rappresenta circa 2600 ONG a livello europeo. Comparo il discorso di CONCORD con quello di organizzazioni pan-Africane attive in Europa. Tale paragone può essere utile per rivelare punti comuni e divergenze relativamente alla problematizzazione di vari temi (es: le diseguaglianze globali sono accidentali? hanno radici storiche?), alle soluzioni proposte (es: più crescita, più commercio internazionale, redistribuzione delle risorse), o alla percezione del ruolo di vari attori (es: l’UE, le ONG stesse), in particolar modo per quanto riguarda lo ‘sviluppo’ in Africa.

L’obiettivo generale è quello di capire quali teorie di sviluppo influenzino i dibattiti a livello europeo tra le organizzazioni della società civile come quelle che studio, così da vedere quanto critici siano i messaggi che raggiungono l’UE attraverso queste organizzazioni. Per far ciò, ho intervistato membri del personale di alcune organizzazioni membre, osservato riunioni, analizzato documenti ufficiali che mostrino le posizioni delle organizzazioni.

È stato affermato come, a livello UE, le ONG debbano essere ‘critiche ma non troppo’[i] se vogliono mantenere le loro relazioni con le istituzioni UE che adottano politiche o che le finanziano. Per capire come le ONG di sviluppo europee riescano a farsi strada nelle relazioni stato-società civile, ho suddiviso le teorie di sviluppo tra convenzionali (quelle che mantengono lo status quo neoliberale), riformiste (quelle che propongono cambiamenti di alcuni elementi del sistema economico, politico e sociale) o radicali (quelle che criticano il sistema nel suo complesso e tentano di proporre un cambio di paradigma). Se l’affermazione di Smismans è valida anche per il settore dello sviluppo, allora le ONG di sviluppo europee dovrebbero tendere, nei loro discorsi, verso teorie presenti nella seconda categoria. Il caso dell’advocacy di CONCORD verso le istituzioni UE sembra confermare questo postulato generale.

La mia ricerca descrive come il discorso cambi nel corso del tempo, in particolare quello di CONCORD nel decennio scorso. Si può notare come sia applicato un insieme di teorie ed approcci, concetti e quadri teorici piuttosto riformisti (es: approcci come quello dello sviluppo umano, dei diritti umani o dello sviluppo sostenibile). Vari quadri teorici possono essere applicati simultaneamente nella costituzione dei discorsi, ed è ciò che sembra avvenire in CONCORD. La presenza sporadica di riferimenti convenzionali (quali quelli alla ‘crescita a favore dei poveri’ verso il 2010)[ii] e di altri ben più radicali (come quelli alla ‘post-crescita’ a partire dal 2019)[iii] aggiungono sfumature rilevanti a questo quadro generale.

Allora perché si tende a posture e teorie riformiste? Questo risultato, che è prima di tutto teoretico, ha anche uno scopo strategico: si tratta di posizionare la confederazione all’interno della governance internazionale dello sviluppo, accettandone la grammatica generale (fatta di paesi donatori, istituzioni e agenzie, attori che implementano, paesi e comunità riceventi, pratiche di valutazione, linguaggio), operando al contempo per dare a tale grammatica dei significati più rispettosi da un punto di vista sociale ed ambientale, mantenendo quindi l’attenzione sugli obiettivi ultimi dello sviluppo (le popolazioni locali ed i loro bisogni). Ciò implica strategie di advocacy e proposte di soluzioni che facciano da ponte tra i bisogni locali (così come percepiti dalla confederazione) e le politiche ed i comportamenti delle istituzioni (così come analizzati dalla confederazione). Significa anche cercare costantemente un equilibrio tra ciò che si considera necessario e ciò che si ritiene raggiungibile (cioè accettabile da donatori e decisori politici).

La ricerca di consenso interno, insieme all’imperativo della rappresentatività di un insieme così grande di ONG, contribuisce inoltre a questa postura riformista. La rappresentatività è una risorsa di credibilità fondamentale nei confronti delle istituzioni politiche, ma può avere come contropartita quella di portare ad un consenso a minima, basato cioè sui temi che il settore ritiene da sempre imprescindibili. Fare lobby per un aumento dell’Aiuto Pubblico allo Sviluppo (APS) dell’UE e degli stati membri è uno di questi: l’aiuto allo sviluppo[iv] è considerato una priorità dalla maggior parte dei membri; il lavoro relativo al finanziamento dello sviluppo è, di conseguenza, un caposaldo della confederazione.

Le discussioni interne alla confederazione stanno però cambiando alla luce dei cambiamenti dell’ambiente esterno e di nuove sfide. Ciò si vede, per esempio, nel recente focus su un’economia al di là della crescita[v], ma anche in dibattiti interni su colonialismo[vi], neo-colonialismo e relazioni UE-Africa[vii]. Anche se questi non indicano necessariamente un cambiamento decisivo nel modo in cui lo sviluppo sia compreso e praticato, mostrano però una tendenza potenziale verso un discorso sullo sviluppo che sia più radicale, più focalizzato su come rimediare passate ingiustizie.

References

[i] S. Smismans, “European civil society and citizenship: Complementary or exclusionary concepts?”, Policy and Society, vol. and So  vol. and Soci

[ii] CONCORD, “EU responsibilities for a just and sustainable world CONCORD Narrative on Development” (https://concordeurope.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/08/CONCORD-Narrative-on-Development.pdf)

[iii] Cox, T. “Economic growth will not cure inequalities”, 25 June 2019, (https://concordeurope.org/2019/06/25/directors-blog-economic-growth-will-not-cure-inequalities/)

[iv] CONCORD, “EU ODA up, but far from levels promised and needed amid international crises – CONCORD press release: OECD DAC 2020 preliminary statistics”, 13 April 2021 (https://concordeurope.org/2021/04/13/eu-oda-up-but-far-from-levels-promised-and-needed-amid-international-crises/)

[v] CONCORD, Talking Development Ep. 1 “Beyond Growth: An Economic Model that works for Everyone”, 09 May 2019 (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NmHHEfx4G6k&t=8s)

[vi] Poissonnier, L. tweet on CONCORD General Assembly 2020, 17 November 2020 (https://twitter.com/Lonne_CONCORD/status/1328711315016339459)

[vii] CONCORD, Talking Development Ep. 8 “How civil society can keep up with the speed of change”, January 2021, mins 7:00 to 12:30, accessed 10 January 2021 (https://soundcloud.com/concord-europe-ngo/how-civil-society-can-keep-up-with-the-speed-of-change)

Opinions expressed in Bliss posts reflect solely the views of the author of the post in question.

About the author:

Valentina Brogna è dottoranda al Centro di Ricerca in Scienza Politica (CReSPo), Université Saint-Louis – Bruxelles (Belgium), attraverso una borsa FRESH (F.R.S. – FNRS). La sua ricerca compara i discorsi relative allo sviluppo di ONG di sviluppo internazionali e Organizzazioni Pan-Africane della diaspora in Europa, operative perlopiù a livello UE. Tali discorsi di riferiscono a varie teorie di sviluppo, in uno spettro che va dallo Sviluppo sostenibile al Rinascimento africano. Prima di intraprendere la ricercar dottorale, ha lavorato in organizzazioni della società civile nel campo dello sviluppo e femministe a livello italiano e UE.

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17th Development Dialogue | A call to end the ‘social distancing’ of the sciences – in the COVID-19 era and beyond

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The chasm that separates the different scientific disciplines remains deep as ever despite the evident need to address pressing global problems through transdisciplinary collaboration. C. Sathyamala and Peter A.G. van Bergeijk in this article show how close and intensive cooperation across the artificial borders between the sciences can be made possible and argue for a methodology acknowledging that only a combination of qualitative and quantitative research can create the type of knowledge that’s required to move forward together.

Hans-Peter Gauster (unsplash)

We start with a proposition: that both social and natural sciences are good at boxing, but not as good at wrestling. They ‘box’ by telling themselves stories about where they and researchers in the respective fields ‘fit’ into the scaffolding erected around the supposedly chiasmic divide of natural and social sciences. We all seem to know what side of this divide we want to be on, and a lot of time is invested in delineation, often drawing distinctions without differences. For too long, specialisation and deeper knowledge, both applied and theoretical, have been seen as the royal road to academic success.

But there are limits to what any science can do on its own. We’ve seen this during the current pandemic. As in any context, COVID-19-related health problems cannot be tackled from a purely medical angle; the exploitative social and economic structures that make people sick must also be challenged. Indeed, the validity of medical solutions to a large extent depends on social and economic conditions of time and place. The pandemic does not provide a new insight – it simply makes it clearer.

The COVID-19 pandemic taught us that by boxing in the disciplines and keeping them apart, we fail in a monumental way to ‘wrestle’ with multi-faceted problems, like global pandemics. We avoid the intellectual battle inherent in engaging with what the other side thinks. To deal with COVID-19 or to understand what is happening, we need less boxing and more wrestling! A mono-disciplinary perspective, however sophisticated, cannot help us design and evaluate policy interventions, or grasp the wider meaning and significance of COVID-19 in specific contexts. A lot of time is now being invested in delineation with other strands and lines of thought based on high principles of epistemology and ontology. Our point is that that energy would be better spend on truly working together.

A physician and an economist…

We write from different sides of a supposedly chiasmic divide, a divide we each try to bridge and straddle in our own ways. C. Sathyamala is a public health physician with a Master’s degree in Epidemiology who opted to do her PhD in development studies at the ISS. In the process, she developed a strong interest in class and state power and in the history of the biopolitics of food and hunger. As a medical doctor concerned with action for social justice, the Bhopal gas leak disaster proved a crucial turning point in her life as corporate interests in collusion with the state effaced people’s lives. The COVID-19 pandemic created similar tendency, displacing the migrant working class across India and subjecting them to what Giorgio Agamben has called ‘bare life’.

As an agnostic Dutch economist, Peter van Bergeijk is the first academic in a family of South Holland-based bakers, carpenters, and farmers. As a policy maker at the OECD, he was frustrated by the impossibility to engage major developing countries in discussions on environment and health. This motivated his move to the ISS, where he is equally happy to employ a neo-Marxist or a ‘empiricist’ framework as a toolkit, depending on what analytical toolbox is most suitable for the problem at hand.

…together critically examining the COVID-19 pandemic

Each of us has written on COVID-19 – on the urgency of communicating our concerns – in the form of  books or a range of Working Papers. Writing from different social and professional positions, we now also write…together. A common interest around COVID-19 has bridged our science-social science divide.

Primarily, we agree that if at all a silver lining is to be found in the COVID-19 situation, it is that we can learn a great deal, especially with mixed disciplinary backgrounds, with science, social sciences, and the arts (we have also worked together artistically: you will find Sathya’s poetry and Peter’s lithography alongside at the exhibition Broken Links).

And we both agree that we will only truly understand pandemics and their consequences, and what to do about protecting human societies from their fallout once social scientists and natural scientists stop practicing social and intellectual distancing by boxing themselves into their own disciplines.

This is more urgent than often recognised: the next pandemic is a certainty, only its timing is uncertain.

The WHO hopes to forge solidarity and encourage the sharing of knowledge across disciplinary and global divides. The purpose is to generate greater consensus around COVID-19.

But while lip service is paid to medical opinion, it is powerful political and economic elites that continue to call the shots.  State interventions provide selective care in the matter of making live and letting die, and even in making die in the Foucauldian biopolitical sense. Academics find themselves struggling to keep up in real time with the pace of the pandemic, with its spread, recurrence, changing pattern, and often its gross mismanagement.

Huge as the problem is, we are pleased to have started our own dialogue, right here at the ISS, and based on our own published and ongoing research on the subject. How COVID-19 affects us now, and what kinds of ‘pandemic futures’ we face, are questions all of us can contribute to answering once we learn to wrestle across our disciplinary divides.

Opinions expressed in Bliss posts reflect solely the views of the author of the post in question.

About the authors:

C. Sathyamala is a public health physician and epidemiologist with a PhD in Development Studies. She is currently a postdoc academic researcher at the International Institute of Social Studies, Den Haag, Erasmus University Rotterdam. Her areas of interest include food security and politics of food, political economy of health, medical ethics, reproductive rights, and environmental justice. She has been active in both the health and women’s movement in India for some decades. She has authored and co-authored books and published in journals, peer-reviewed and otherwise, and in newspapers on wide-ranging topics. 

Peter van Bergeijk is professor of international economics and macroeconomics at the ISS.

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Development Dialogue 2018 | Social acceptance of oil activities in the Ecuadorian Amazon: a long way to go by Alberto Diantini

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Oil companies are coming to realise that they need a ‘Social Licence to Operate’—the acceptance of locals—to reduce social risk associated with their activities. But how do they achieve this community acceptance, especially in areas of the Amazon forest inhabited by indigenous peoples?

Extractive companies are usually unpopular and mistrusted. For them, it is increasingly evident that a legal, formal licence of operation from governments is not enough. To avoid costly protests, they need a Social Licence to Operate (SLO), generally defined as the acceptance of local communities of their activities. It is a kind of social, unwritten contract that ensures an enterprise’s social risk is reduced as long as priorities and expectations of the local communities are satisfied: the higher the SLO, the lower the risk (Prno & Slocombe, 2012).

Although the SLO concept was developed in Western contexts, it has been increasingly adopted in developing regions as well. In Latin America, for example, in the case of projects affecting indigenous peoples, the main common issues are power imbalances, conflicting worldviews, and informed consent, but these SLO key elements are largely overlooked (Ehrnström-Fuentes & Kröger, 2017).

As a contribution to filling this gap, my research aims to critically analyse the usability of the SLO concept as indicator of community acceptability in Latin America. In particular, I am focusing on the oil context of Block 10, in the Ecuadorian Amazon, managed by the Italian company Eni-Agip. The area is inhabited by indigenous groups, which are mostly Kichwa. Eni-Agip’s good reputation at the national level, its community investments (medical assistance and education programmes), and the apparent low level of conflicts in the block could suggest that the company has obtained an SLO from the locals. But is this the case?

To answer this question, I went to Ecuador and got in touch with researchers from the local university, the Estatal Amazónica of Puyo. Together, we planned a household survey in the villages of the affected area, examining people’s perceptions of positive and negative effects related to Eni-Agip’s operations. We also investigated whether locals perceive that the ‘Free, Prior, Informed Consent’ (FPIC) principle has been applied in this context. FPIC establishes that indigenous communities have the right to participate in the decision-making process pertaining to the activities that affect their territories. Before beginning oil operations, communities should have a full understanding of project’s risks and benefits and freely give informed consent (Hanna & Vanclay, 2013).

In order to facilitate interactions with the community members who don’t speak Spanish at all, a group of Kichwa students attending the university was included in our research team. This enabled me to be more easily accepted inside the communities: since I am Italian, people initially saw me as a potential spy of the Italian government or of the enterprise.

A total number of 346 questionnaires were completed and all villages of the influence area were surveyed. Preliminary results show that most respondents think the presence of the company is compromising the environment and irreversibly changing their culture. On the other hand, people rely on the social programmes previously offered by the oil company which Eni-Agip now claims are the duty of the State.

In effect, the most recent national oil contract stipulates that the government shall now provide these social services, but the State has been unable to meet this responsibility, in part due to the remoteness of these communities.

Almost 87% of the population doesn’t know what FPIC is. In addition, some of the interviewees reported cases in which they have been forced to accept the decisions of the company, with attempts of coercion.

It is noteworthy that during the survey, many people told us they fear that if they criticise Eni-Agip in any way, the company would cut social programs altogether.

In conclusion, despite the low level of conflicts and the good reputation of the company, interviewees reported the same impacts found in many other oil contexts of Ecuador and Latin America, such as cultural changes, dependence on the company, and lack of respect of FPIC procedures. Overall, the evidence of Eni-Agip’s high control of community consent, the absence of the State, and the vulnerability of indigenous communities are elements that seem to limit the genuine achievement of balanced power relationships, the core elements of a social licence. Therefore, caution is necessary prior to claim that a company has achieved an SLO in such a complex and conflicted territory. Much has to be done by the State to meet its responsibilities and by the company for a full respect of indigenous populations’ rights.

References:
Ehrnström-Fuentes, M., & Kröger, M. (2017). In the shadows of social licence to operate: untold investment grievances in latin America. Journal of Cleaner Production, 141, 346–358.
Hanna, P., & Vanclay, F. (2013). Human rights, Indigenous peoples and the concept of Free, Prior and Informed Consent. Impact Assessment and Project Appraisal, 31(2), 146–157.
Prno, J., & Slocombe, D. (2012). Exploring the origins of “social license to operate” in the mining sector: Perspectives from governance and sustainability theories. Resources Policy, 37(3), 346–357.

This blog article is part of a series related to the Development Dialogue 2018 Conference that was recently held at the ISS. Other articles forming part of the series can be read here,  here , here, here here, and here.

About the author:

Diantini_Alberto

Alberto Diantini is a PhD researcher in Geographical Studies at the University of Padua, Italy, supervised by prof. Massimo De Marchi, coordinator of the “Territories of ecological and cultural diversity” research group. The main objective of Diantini’s research is investigating the usability of the concept of Social Licence to Operate in the oil contexts of the Ecuadorian Amazon.

 

Development Dialogue 2018 | Who decides who gets social protection? by Maria Klara Kuss

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Colourful pens

Social protection interventions have recently been scaled up in sub-Saharan Africa. While international aid donors have invested much money, time and effort into the policy design phase, the real politics start to unfold during its implementation phase. This is when people experience who will receive benefits and who is excluded. What can the case of Zambia tell us about the political debates  on who ‘deserves’ social protection and who does not?

THE POLITICS OF IMPLEMENTING SOCIAL PROTECTION

In sub-Saharan Africa, the social protection agenda has been largely driven by international aid donors who have invested many resources into influencing the design and scale-up of these interventions. It is therefore not surprising that much evidence exists on the positive impacts of social protection interventions on a range of indicators (e.g. on poverty, health, and education). Moreover, recent research into the politics of social protection has shed light on the political drivers of the expansion of social protection in sub-Saharan Africa. Thus, much attention has been given to the policy design rather than the implementation phase.

This can however be particular misleading in in the area of social protection. This is because the deep politics – and thus the negotiations for social justice – unfold after its implementation. This is when it becomes more visible for the public who will and who will not receive those benefits (see Grindle & Thomas, 1991). This can be illustrated by the findings from my PhD research that analyses the politics of implementing social cash transfers (SCTs) in Zambia.

SOCIAL CASH TRANSFERS IN ZAMBIA – A RICH HISTORY IN TARGETING

In Zambia, around 54% of the population lives in poverty, and almost 41% in extreme poverty (CSO, 2015). Similar to other African countries, most of the country’s poor (77%) live in rural areas (CSO, 2015). To reduce poverty and eradicate the intergenerational transmission of poverty (see MCDMCH, 2012), international aid donors have supported the Government of Zambia in initiating different SCT schemes. Since 2003, in total four small-scale SCT schemes were piloted – each targeting different groups of poor people (e.g. children, female-headed households, old people, and people with disabilities or chronic diseases). These schemes were strongly driven by Zambia’s aid donors while the Government of Zambia has long remained reluctant in taking the schemes beyond its pilot phase.

Finally in 2014, the Government of Zambia took the vital decision to introduce a single nation-wide SCT scheme. The commitment to implement a single SCT scheme meant that the Zambian Government took a vital decision about whom they considered most deserving of receiving support in form of SCTs. The proposed targeting approach of the new scheme included a range of household compositions such as households with old people, people with disabilities, as well as households with young women caring for children. Given the variety of households included, the new SCT scheme was named ‘the Inclusive Scheme’.

THE TRANSFORMATIVE IMPLICATIONS OF ZAMBIA’S ‘INCLUSIVE SCHEME’

The targeting approach together with the formal policy objective of the ‘Inclusive Scheme’ signalled a potentially transformative change of Zambia’s welfare regime with its underpinning values of social justice. This was because it included young women and their children who previously did not receive any benefits. My research findings however indicate that the Inclusive Scheme did not result in a transformation, but rather in the continuation of Zambia’s political settlement with its values of social justice.

Only shortly after the implementation of the scheme in local communities, strong local opposition emerged because as it became clearer who would and would not benefit from the Inclusive Scheme. A series of debates about the deservingness of young women and their children followed. But instead of transforming the perceptions of powerholders about their deservingness, the powerful local resistance resulted in a drastic change of the targeting approach of the Inclusive Scheme. This fundamentally changed the values of social justice that underpinned the scheme.

THE DEEP POLITICS OF SOCIAL PROTECTION

In order to understand the deep politics of social protection, it is therefore crucial to pay attention to the implementation phase. This is not a phase where decisions are carried out in a bureaucratic manner, but where political reactions are likely to occur since the implications of the policy design become apparent. People will understand who will be included and who will be excluded from receiving social protection benefits. If these policy ideas are competing with people’s perceptions of social justice, local opposition is likely to emerge. This can pose a threat to the sustainability of the initial policy design with its underpinning values of social justice and thus compromise the investments made during the design phase.

­­­­­Disclaimer:

This blog article builds on the findings of PhD research by Maria Klara Kuss which analyses the negotiations of Zambia’s welfare regime and is based at the United Nations University MERIT’s Graduate School of Governance at Maastricht University in the Netherlands. For more information see: Kuss, M. K. (forthcoming). After the scale-up: the political drivers of sustaining social protection in Zambia. GIZ policy brief. Eschborn: GIZ.

References:
CSO (2015). 2015 Living Conditions Monitoring Survey Report. Lusaka: Central Statistical Office.
Grindle, M., & Thomas, J. (1991). Public choices and policy change. Baltimore: The Johns Hopkins University Press.
MCDMCH (2012). Harmonised Manual of Operations. Social Cash Transfer Scheme. Lusaka: Ministry of Community Development, Mother and Child Health.

This blog article is part of a series related to the Development Dialogue 2018 Conference that was recently held at the ISS. Other articles forming part of the series can be read here,  here , here, here and here.

About the author:

PhotoMKussMaria Klara Kuss is a PhD fellow in Public Policy and Policy Analysis at the United Nations University MERIT’s Graduate School of Governance – supervised by Allister J McGregor (Sheffield), Mark Bevir (UC Berkeley), and Franziska Gassmann (Maastricht). She is also affiliated to the African Studies Centre at Leiden University (ASCL). Her PhD research is interdisciplinary in nature and draws on anthropological and sociological approaches to public policy analysis. It analyses the de facto negotiations of Zambia’s welfare regime with a focus on the transformative impacts of social cash transfers.

Development Dialogue 2018 | Pan-African diasporas in the Brussels bubble: new actors, new business? by Valentina Brogna

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Pan-African diasporic networks are emerging in Europe as new lobbying actors within EU-Africa relations under the prism of development cooperation. Who are they, and can they influence EU development policy? This article shows that pan-African diasporic networks as new actors within (or without) EU-Africa relations try to propose different narratives on the African continent, advancing the cause of African-led development.

EU-Africa relations are tightly linked to development cooperation. Civil society tries to influence development policies, gathering around International Non-Governmental Development Organisations (INGDOs). Recently, pan-African diasporic networks have been created with apparently similar purposes, gaining visibility in the same EU political instances, but also African (AU, ACP Group) and international ones.

Many questions relate to the rising of pan-African diasporic networks in Europe, including on development theory (which paradigm(s)?), EU lobbying (which advocacy strategies? why lobbying the EU?), social movement studies (do pan-African diasporic networks and INGDOs ignore, clash, co-opt one another?), and African and diaspora studies (how do pan-African diasporic networks evaluate their representativeness as the sixth African Region?). With these questions in mind, I enucleate the ‘diaspora’ concept and sketch features of some pan-African Diasporic Networks active at European level.

CONCEPTUALISING PAN-AFRICAN DIASPORIC NETWORKS

I consider African ‘diaspora(s)’ inasmuch as networks and organisations that take ownership of this term, a “category of mobilization” (Kleist 2008, cited in Sinatti and Horst 2015), with the aim to unify what seems disperse, thus strengthening their agency vis-à-vis political institutions. Definitions of ‘diaspora’ in scientific literature stress ideas of dispersion (of people in distant places, normally abroad), relation-keeping (with the hailing country) (Van Hier, Pieke, Vertovec 2004, cited in Norglo et al. 2016), transnationality (Clifford 1994, cited in Norglo et al. 2016, Sökefeld 2006) and imagined community (Sökefeld 2006, Anderson 1983).

Institutional legitimation to African diasporas’ engagement in different fora is given by the AU definition: “Peoples of African origin living outside the continent, irrespective of their citizenship and nationality and who are willing to contribute to the development of the continent and the building of the African Union” (AU 2005, point VIII, 18). By finding themselves in between social places, African diasporas could have a comparative advantage vis-à-vis traditionally conceived INGDOs (Brinkerhoff 2011). African diaspora representatives at EU level are today advancing the cause of African diasporas’ formal recognition in development cooperation (Bora, pers. comm.; Global Diaspora Week 2018).

Pan-African diasporic networks regroup people from different African countries. They operate at national and international level with purposes of inclusion and anti-racism in the societies of residence and betterment of living conditions in the countries of origin. Which visions of development do pan-African diasporic networks concretely strategise to put in practice? When lobbying at EU level, they tend to officially espouse the Sustainable Development framework (UN 2015), probably as the contrary would imply working outside political institutions tout-court, renouncing to any attempt of influence (Ebony, pers. comm.).

Many of these networks are Brussels-based. The EU capital also gathers the AU Permanent Mission to the EU, the ACP Group Secretariat: multi-institutional strategies can thus be considered here. Among these networks, created since 2011, we find the African Diaspora Youth Network in Europe (ADYNE – 2011), the Africa-Europe Diaspora Development Platform (ADEPT – 2013), the A.C.P. Young Professionals Network (ACP YPN – 2014), the African Diaspora Youth Forum in Europe (ADYFE – 2014), the African Diaspora Network in Europe (ADNE – 2015), and the Afro-European Diaspora Platform (AED – 2015). The European Year on Development might have had a triggering effect.

ADNE operates through lobbying events with EU institutions. They have individual and organisational membership, a diverse expertise (both thematically and geographically), an enabling social capital (ex: professional connections to the EP, the ACP Secretariat, DG DEVCO). ADEPT, created within the Joint Africa-Europe Strategy, has organisational membership and aims to become the umbrella organisation of African diasporas. ACP YPN, now a member of ADEPT, works to influence EU, AU and the ACP Group with regards to youth empowerment in the implementation of the Cotonou agreement, currently being renegotiated; its membership is individual only, but its members are highly proactive. Competition among these organisations is probable; lack of unity is often deplored and calls for better cooperation are made, without (for the moment) leading to concrete results (Global Diaspora Week 2018).

Other pan-African diasporic networks define themselves as clearly pan-Africanist (Boukari-Yabara 2014) and follow the African Renaissance ideal (Diop  1948; do-Nascimento 2008), detached from the mainstream development paradigm and classic EU-Africa relations: the International Movement for the Renaissance of a Unified Africa (MIRAU), the Pan-African League Umoja (LP-U), and its Belgian branch Renaissance Africaine. They operate for the development of African countries by Africans themselves (including African diasporas), persuaded that EU-Africa relations are not a priority in the quest for a genuine ‘rebirth’ of the continent.

To conclude, pan-African diasporic networks as new actors within (or without) EU-Africa relations try to propose different narratives on the African continent, debunking some development cooperation myths, advancing the cause of African-led development, in cooperation with external actors like the EU or autonomously.

References:
ACP YPN, n. d. http://www.acpypn.com, accessed 25/07/2017
ADEPT, n. d., http://www.adept-platform.org/about-us/ accessed 25/07/2017
AED, n. d. https://diasporafroeuropeenne.org/presentation-2/ accessed 18/08/2018
ADNE. n.d. http://www.africandiasporanetwork.eu/en/aboutus.html Accessed 05/05/2018
ADYFE, n. d. www.adyfe.eu, accessed 15/08/2018
African Union. 2005. ‘Report of the Meeting of Experts on the Definition of the African Diaspora’, 11 – 12 April 2005, Addis Ababa. http://www.dirco.gov.za/diaspora/definition.html. Accessed 04/05/2018
Anderson, B. 1983. Imagined communities: reflections on the origin and spread of nationalism, London: Verso.
Boukari-Yabara, A. 2014. Africa Unite. Une histoire du Panafricanisme, Paris : La Découverte
Brinkerhoff, J. M. 2011. ‘David and Goliath: Diaspora organizations as partners in the development industry’ In Public Administration and Development 31: 37-49 10.1002/pad.587
Diop, Ch. A. 1948. “Quand pourra-t-on parler d’une renaissance africaine?” In Le musée vivant, N. spécial 36-37, 57-65. Paris : ADAM
do-Nascimento, A. J. (ed.) 2008. La renaissance africaine comme alternative au développement. Les termes du choix politique en Afrique. Paris: L’Harmattan
L.P.-U n. d., http://lp-umoja.com/lpu/onepage/ accessed 12/12/2017
MIRAU n.d., http://www.mirau.org accessed 10/02/2018
Norglo, B. E. K., Goris, M., Lie, R., and Ong’ayo, A. O. 2016. ‘The African Diaspora’s Public Participation in Policy-Making Concerning Africa’. In Diaspora Studies 9(2): 83–99
Renaissance Africaine asbl, n. d., https://www.linkedin.com/company/raasbl/ accessed 13/08/2018
Sinatti, G. and Cindy Horst. 2015. ‘Migrants as agents of development: Diaspora engagement discourse and practice in Europe’ In Ethnicities 15(1): 134-152
Sökefeld, M. 2006. ‘Mobilizing in Transnational Space: A Social Movement Approach to the Formation of Diaspora’ In Global Networks 6 (3): 265–84
UN A/RES/70/1 Transforming our world: the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development https://sustainabledevelopment.un.org/post2015/transformingourworld accessed 05/03/2017
Interviews:
Bora, ACP Young Professionals Network, Advocacy and Parliamentary Relations Officer, 18 October 2017
Ebony, ACP Young Professionals Network, Policy advisor, 30 January 2018
Observed meetings:
22/05/2017, Conference The impact of Communications on EU’s Policies on Africa, organised by Africa Communications Week; EU DG DEVCO, Brussels
23/05/2017, Conference Changing African Narratives through Diaspora Initiatives, organised by Africa Communications Week; AU Permanent Mission to the EU, Brussels
27/09/2017, Conference Africa at a Crossroads: Youth Political Mobilisation, Freedom of Association and Peaceful Assembly, organised by the Foundation for European Progressive Studies (FEPS) and SOLIDAR as part of the S&D Group Africa Week 2017; FEPS, Brussels
21/03/2018, Cercle Kilimandjaro de l’Université Saint-Louis – Bruxelles (USL-B), Conference L’impératif panafricain: penser la repolitisation, with the participation by Dr. A. Boukari-Yabara, LP-U Secretary General ; USL-B, Brussels
05/10/2018, Global Diaspora Week 2018 Opening Ceremony Digital Diaspora. Boosting the Digital Agenda and Innovation for Development, organised by ADNE; European Parliament, Brussels

This blog article is part of a series related to the Development Dialogue 2018 Conference that was recently held at the ISS. Other articles forming part of the series can be read here,  here , here, and here.

Valentina photo

About the author:

Valentina Brogna is a PhD researcher under FSR grant at the Research Centre in Political Science (CReSPo), Université Saint-Louis – Bruxelles. Her research focuses on the participation of pan-African diasporic networks and INGDOs within EU-Africa relations, mainly in the Post-Cotonou negotiations.

Development Dialogue 2018 | Social cash transfers: the risk of Malawi’s donor dependence by Roeland Hemsteede

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Social cash transfers are becoming more popular, especially in regions such as sub-Saharan Africa. But what happens when the government does not support these programmes? Roeland Hemsteede shows that in Malawi, the dependence on donor funding and lack of government buy-in pose a risk to hundreds of thousands of people whose livelihoods depend on these transfers.

Direct cash transfers to the poor and vulnerable are rapidly gaining popularity around the world, reaching 750 million to 1 billion people, including many in sub-Saharan Africa. They typically aim to improve the welfare of beneficiaries as well as to increase their investment in human capital (Arnold, Conway, & Greenslade, 2011).

Malawi’s Social Cash Transfer Programme (SCTP) targets the ultra-poor and labour constrained and reaches 10% of the population. Currently, it reaches 276,063 beneficiary households with a total of 1,159,691 members. While national leadership is seen as essential to development processes, the SCTP bears all signs of being donor-driven, with limited buy-in from Malawi’s political elites. This jeopardises the long-term future of the SCTP. This blog explores some of the causes and consequences of this limited buy-in.

SUPPORTING MALAWI´S SOCIAL CASH TRANSFER PROGRAMME

The funding landscape for the SCTP is highly fragmented (Hemsteede, 2017). Donors fund the transfers in 27 out of Malawi’s 28 districts, while the Government of Malawi (GoM) funds the remaining district. This GoM funding is the result of one donor requiring 10% counterpart funding, yet its provision has been irregular. Several other development partners provide technical assistance to the two GoM ministries that are involved.

WHY THE DEVELOPMENT COMMUNITY LIKES THE SCTP

The development community sees the SCTP as the ‘golden boy’ of social protection in Malawi. It is generally well run and the impact evaluations are positive (Handa, Mvula, Angeles, Tsoka, & Barrington, 2016). The GoM realises that donors like the programme, which contributes to its reluctance to finance it; after all, many programmes that donors are less interested in also need funding. Meanwhile, the donors are happy to retain strong (financial) control over the cash transfer, not least because of the ‘cash gate’ scandal.

‘Cash gate’, a large corruption scandal uncovered in 2013, strongly damaged donors’ confidence in Malawi’s public finance management. As a result, many donors felt that providing direct budget support was no longer acceptable, but project support was still an option. The SCTP was such a project, as much of its finances are managed by an independent consultancy firm that is hired by one of the donors. Moreover, the idea that the money directly went to beneficiaries appealed to donors. As a result, funding for the SCTP increased, but the system operates almost completely in parallel to the government’s own systems.

PERCEPTION OF POLITICS

Politicians in Malawi, who ultimately control budget allocations, are less enthusiastic. In my interviews with them, they frequently voiced the opinion that money should rather go to the ‘productive poor’ and that cash transfers were not a good solution—an opinion also held by others (Hamer & Seekings, 2017; Kalebe-Nyamongo & Marquette, 2014).

Members of Parliament also often criticised the SCTP’s implementation, arguing that as representatives of the people, they should have a role in the targeting of beneficiaries, and that it bypassed government’s systems, making it hard for them to maintain oversight. All this contributes to a situation whereby some politicians feel that they don’t own the SCTP and that it is a ‘donors’ thing’.

THE IMPORTANCE OF NATIONAL OWNERSHIP

My data point to at least three major reasons why national ownership of the SCTP should be important.

  • It is essential to ensure the sustainability of the cash transfers.
  • Leadership is essential for domestic and international resource mobilisation.
  • As part of Sustainable Development Goal 17, the Paris Declaration, and the Accra Agenda for Action, governments should lead their development priorities.

In the case of the SCTP, however, the development community drives the programme by controlling the funding and technical knowledge. The two involved ministries: the Ministry of Gender, Children Disability and Social Welfare, and parts of the Ministry of Finance, Economic Planning and Development, appear strongly committed to the programme, but their hands are tied by the lack of resources.

CONCLUSION

The SCTP resulted from a strong push by development partners, who funded its creation and expansion. They strongly influenced its design and the decision to create parallel structures for managing the SCTP. Malawi’s political establishment meanwhile feels little ownership over the programme. Without this sense of ownership, they are unlikely to ensure the sustainability of the SCTP. This poses a risk to the hundreds of thousands of people whose livelihoods depend on the SCTP if donors reduce their funding in the future.

References
Arnold, C., Conway, T., & Greenslade, M. (2011). DFID Cash Transfers Evidence Paper. Policy Division Papers.
Hamer, S., & Seekings, J. (2017). Social protection, electoral competition, and political branding in Malawi (No. WIDER Working Paper 99/2017).
Handa, S., Mvula, P., Angeles, G., Tsoka, M., & Barrington, C. (2016). Malawi Social Cash Transfer Programme Endline Impact Evaluation Report. Chapel Hill.
Kalebe-Nyamongo, C., & Marquette, H. (2014). Elite Attitudes Towards Cash Transfers and the Poor in Malawi. Research Paper 30. Retrieved from http://publications.dlprog.org/EliteAttitudesCTs.pdf

This blog article is part of a series related to the Development Dialogue 2018 Conference that was recently held at the ISS. Other articles forming part of the series can be read here and here.

About the author:

Profile RoelandRoeland Hemsteede is a PhD student at the University of Dundee in Scotland, United Kingdom. In his research he explores how power relations at the national and international level affect the design and implementation of cash transfer programmes in Malawi and Lesotho. Previous blogs on this subject have been published on SocialProtection.org and can be found at http://socialprotection.org/learn/blog/authors/author/1338/latest-posts. Roeland obtained his Master degree (by Research) in African Studies from Leiden University in 2013 and took several extra-curricular courses focussing on the political economy of development at the International Institute of Social Studies in The Hague in 2012/13.

 

Development Dialogue 2018 | Do children entering preschool early develop more quickly? by Saikat Ghosh and Subhasish Dey

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Colourful pens

Despite fierce debate among scholars regarding the age at which children are ready to enter preschool, the issue remains contentious. This article based on an empirical footing argues that earlier preschool entry is better for children living in developing countries like India, as it can help to ‘level the playing field.’

ENTRY AGE: A LONG-DEBATED ISSUE

There is considerable debate regarding the age at which children are ready to enter preschool. However, scholars seem not to have been able to reach any conclusion regarding the link between children’s development and schooling age. There are two principal views on this issue that shape the age-of-entry debate both at the policy and practice level: First, entry with maturity, and, second, entry followed by maturity.

The first view is a maturational point of view that expects the child to be mature and ready for school. Reaching only a specific age does not ensure that a child is ready for school, nor does it guarantee a specific level of development. The conventional wisdom is that older children are more likely to have the necessary skills and maturity to succeed in school and therefore learn more in each grade (Cmic & Lamberty 1994; Krauerz 2005; Graue & DiPema 2000). Therefore, advocates of maturational view propose a delay in entrance to kindergarten for a child who is not ready, and such delay gives the child an extra year to become developmentally ready. This trend was described by the phrase “graying of kindergarten” (Bracey 1989), which is recently known as “redshirting” (Katz, 2000).

On the other hand, people holding the alternative view believe that the only determining factor for entry into kindergarten should be chronological age. This entry criterion is exogenous and less susceptible to cultural or social biases (Brent et al. 1996; Kagan, 1990; Stipek 2002). Besides, development is uneven and multidimensional, and thus, a threshold cannot be identified, as children’s level of development varies across different dimensions and children are not likely to achieve the level considered important for school success in all domains at the same time (Stipek 2002: 4).

Yet, very little is known in the context of developing countries, and whether the variation in the age of entry in preschool has any impact on children’s later development is still an open question. The authors took the initiative[1] to explore the same debate in the Indian context. As children from developing countries like India face several challenges from the very beginning, therefore, it is utterly significant to examine whether early entry in preschool provides them with an edge.

DOES AGE OF ENTRY MATTER?

The answer in this context is yes, it matters, and it is evident form the study that the age of entry into preschool is utterly significant for children’s later development. Empirical evidence indicates that early entry into preschool may help children to acquire better cognitive and socio-emotional skills. The study has also found significant variation in children’s development depending on their socioeconomic background viz. parents’ level of education, their ethnic origin, etc. Considering the socioeconomic and cultural background of Indian society (as reflected within the household and parents characteristics), the results suggest that early entry into preschool has significant effects both on social and cognitive development of the child at least after a one-year completion of primary education. Therefore, the study advocates in favour of early preschool entry which has been referred by the authors as ‘Green-Shirting’.

Considering children from developing countries, where various forms of inequalities are already present, several differences may exist between children of lower socio-economic status and those of higher socio-economic status even before they enter preschool. Therefore, it is particularly necessary to provide children with a strong foundation from the very beginning so that these early disadvantages can be tackled.

Early childhood education and care provisions can be important intervention for children’s development. For example, the publicly provided preschool education in India, known as the ‘Anganwadi Centre’, which is the predominant type of preschool in India, represents an important and an effective initiative in ensuring both the social and cognitive development of children in the later stage of their life. Early entry into preschool and therefore, longer preschool experiences, can help to ‘level the field.’

[1] The study on which this article is based was carried out by the authors in India and is based on a primary data of 1,369 households. Ten different parameters were used to measure children’s development, which was further disentangled into cognitive and social development.
References
Bracey, G. (1989). Age and achievement. Phi Delta Kappan, 70(9): 732.
Brent, D., D. May & D. Kundert (1996) ‘The incidence of delayed school entry: A twelve-year review’, Early Education Development 7(2):121-135.
Cmic, K. & G. Larnberty (1994) ‘Reconsidering school readiness’, Early Education and Development 5(2): 91- 105.
Graue, E. & J. DiPerna (2000). Redshirting and early retention: Who gets the gift of time and what are its outcomes?. American Educational Research Journal, 37(2): 509-534.
Kagan, S. L. (1990). Readiness past, present and future: Shaping the agenda. Young Children 48(1): 48-53.
Katz, L. (2000). Academic redshirting and young children. ERIC. Washington, DC, Office of Education Research and Improvement.
Krauerz, K. (2005). Straddling early learning and early elementary school. Journal of the National Association for the Education of Young Children 64(3): 50-58.
Stipek, D. (2002). At what age should children enter kindergarten? A question for policy makers and parents. SRCD Social Policy Report 16(2): 3-16.

This blog article is part of a series related to the Development Dialogue 2018 Conference that was recently held at the ISS.

About the authors:ghosh

Dr. Saikat Ghosh has recently received his doctorate from the University of Bamberg, Germany. His research interest centres on poverty, education, inequality, and social policy analysis with particular focus on developing countries. Formerly, he has worked for the Bamberg Graduate School of Social Sciences (BAGSS), Germany, and UNU-WIDER, Helsinki. He also served the Government of West Bengal, India for six years between 2007 to 2013.

deyDr. Subhasish Dey is an Associate Lecturer at the Economics Department of University of York, UK. He is an applied microecometrician working in the field of development and political economy. He completed his PhD in Economics from University of Manchester in 2016. His research interests include social protection programme, impact evaluation of social policies, electoral politics, affirmative action and routine immunisation. He served government of West Bengal for five years between 2003 and 2008 in education and Panchyat and rural development departments.

Development Dialogue 2018 | Blue Economy: A New Frontier of an African Renaissance? by Johan Spamer

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The African Union recently proclaimed that the ‘Blue Economy’, as the ocean economy is increasingly known, could become the ‘New Frontier of an African Renaissance’. The Blue Economy promises sustainable development through its focus on socio-economic inclusion and the protection of the maritime environment, but is it really all it promises to be? With the first global conference on the sustainable development of the blue economy taking place in two weeks, this article takes a closer look at what the Blue Economy is about.  

It was as late as 2012 that the Blue Economy was officially recognised at the Third International Conference on Sustainable Development in Rio de Janeiro (Rio+20). In the absence of a universal definition, Verma (2018) argues that the Blue Economy can be regarded as “the integration of ocean economy with the principles of social inclusion, environmental sustainability, and innovative, dynamic business models” (p.103). As such, the Blue Economy offers a new and alternative sustainability approach that goes beyond simply harmonising activities in an ecologically friendly manner. It’s a notion that grew out of the Green Economy (Claudio, 2013), but with different policies and frameworks, offering its own characteristics and domain for countries whose futures are based on maritime resources. Africa is calling the Blue Economy narrative the frontline of the continent’s rebirth, but what is this new notion, and how is it different from other blue-infused (e.g. Europe’s blue growth) drives?

AFRICA’S NEW (BLUE) DEVELOPMENT INITIATIVE

The paths followed by leading African countries (e.g. Seychelles, Mauritius, Kenya and South Africa) in establishing Blue Economy frameworks are important, and so is the manner in which these countries go about it by establishing dedicated departments for implementation. The Blue Economy per definition offers an opportunity to prevent the vulnerable, often also marginalised populations, from missing out on socio-economic opportunities in the maritime sector. Furthermore, these beneficiaries can now obtain a fair share of the public good, claim their voices on an equal footing, and can attain a secured sense of dignity through unlocking wealth opportunities.

At least, this is the picture painted by African legislators. However, we are still lacking sufficient empirical data and scientific research to substantiate these foreseen outcomes. Critique against or endorsements of the African Blue Economy are both reference to ad hoc cases and by making broad conclusions in the absence of rigourous in-depth case analyses. Furthermore, the scope of the Blue Economy within the African context includes lakes, rivers, dams, and underground water. It goes beyond the traditional coastal and ocean-based economies with landlocked countries also included in the regional strategies (UNECA, 2016). This makes generalisation and case comparisons with non-African Blue Economy countries complex.

Central to this approach, and within the context of people-orientated sustainability (Attri and Bohler-Muller, 2018), is the principle of social justice through fairness (equity) and inclusivity. The aforesaid echoes strongly with the SDGs’ sentiment (see SDG 14) to ensure long-term sustainability by:

  • Enhancing and leveraging newly received benefits from the ocean environments to the benefit of all (inclusivity) through activities such as bioprospecting, allocated fishing quotas or rights, oil and mineral extraction agreements;
  • Fostering national equality (parity which includes gender equity), allowing for inclusive growth associated with decent employment for all; and
  • Having strong international governance structures and measurements in place to specifically guide the developing country regimes for nearby seabed development. This relates to the management of their rights and interests to be properly sanctioned in the expansion of their national waters beyond the current state dominion.

Keen et al. (2018) provide a useful overview of the Blue Economy. As expected, the three main sustainable components (economic, social alias community and ecosystem) underpin the core Blue Economy aspects. These components are complemented by enabling institutional arrangements as well as technological capacity, reflecting the linkages within such a multi-scalar model. The three predominant concepts that are important to oversee this sustainable development framework are: a) agency, b) power, and c) politics.

As such, we can contextualise and link these concepts within the domain of development studies in the following manner (although not limited to): the need for agency through institutional platforms (e.g. multi-stakeholder initiatives), power relations (e.g. gender), influencing the political economy (e.g. the role of the developmental state), political ecology (e.g. ecosystem resilience), and the role of technology (e.g. innovation).

Notable is the acknowledgement of the importance of diversity (cultural values) and gender equity. The Indian Ocean Rim Association’s (IORA) Declaration on Gender Equality and Women’s Economic Empowerment, adopted at the 16th Council of Ministers Meeting in 2016 (Bali, Indonesia), affirmed the overall commitment towards the promotion of women’s rights (Verma, 2018). The success of the Blue Economy as an exemplar for promoting inclusiveness and equity depends on how different vulnerable groups such as marginalised women, skill-deficient persons, and poor communities are incorporated. At a theoretical level, the Blue Economy is portrayed as an evolutionary concept over the long term. The benefits are foreseen to mainly depend on the theories still to be developed by the scholarly activity in this research domain (Attri, 2018).

THE BLUE CANVAS: PAINTING THE FUTURE

The Blue Economy as a sustainable development framework explains how social justice and equality can be addressed on different levels, especially for the most vulnerable. Partnerships, capacity building, infrastructure development and country-level frameworks are very important in the process of opening up new markets and allowing for greater access in a sustainable way. Barbesgaard (2018) challenges this view, labelling ‘blue growth’ as ocean grabbing. This view is supported by Brent et al. (2018), who highlight contradictions within the blue economy’s ethos and question the promise of an inclusive three-fold win on a socio-economic-ecological level.  Still, this is what Africa seems to be calling for (at least the African Union), and the Blue Economy is seen as the vessel to cross to new (socially just) opportunities by keeping a balance between factors; more growth but with less unsustainable practices.

Kenya will be hosting the first global Sustainable Blue Economy Conference from 26-28 November 2018 in Nairobi.  All are invited, with special arrangements to welcome the marginalised and often excluded parties (e.g. poor communities and small-scale fishers). However, the question remains: will all have equal voices and approve the agenda? See http://www.blueeconomyconference.go.ke/ for more details.

References
Attri, V.N. (2018). The Blue Economy and the Theory of Paradigm Shifts. In Attri, V.N. and Bohler-Muller, N. (Eds). (2018). The Blue Economy Handbook of the Indian Ocean Region. (pp. 15 – 37).  Africa Institute of South Africa.
Attri, V.N. and Bohler-Muller, N. (2018). The Beginning of the Journey. In Attri, V.N. and Bohler-Muller, N. (Eds.). (2018). The Blue Economy Handbook of the Indian Ocean Region. (pp. 1 – 12). Africa Institute of South Africa.
African Union (2012). 2050 Africa’s integrated maritime strategy, version 1.0. African Union.
Barbesgaard, M. (2018). Blue growth: saviour or ocean grabbing? The Journal of Peasant Studies, 45 (1) 130 – 149.
Brent, Z.W., Barbesgaard, M. and Pedersen, C. (2018). The Blue Fix: Unmasking the politics behind the promise of blue growth. Transnational Institute.
Claudio, C. (2013). From Green to Blue Economy. Philippines Daily Enquirer 23 June 2013. Available at: http://business.inquirer.net/128587/from-green-to-blue-economy [Accessed 23 Augustus 2018].
Keen, M.R., Schwarz A-M and Wini-Simeon. Towards defining the Blue Economy: Practical lessons from Pacific Ocean governance. Marine policy, 88 (2018), 333-341.
UNCTAD. (2014). The Oceans Economy: Opportunities and Challenges for Small Island Developing States. United Nations Publications.
Verma, N. (2018). Integrating a Gender Perspective into the Blue Economy. In Attri, V.N. and Bohler-Muller, N. (Eds.). (2018). The Blue Economy Handbook of the Indian Ocean Region. (pp. 98 – 124). Africa Institute of South Africa.
UNECA. (2016). Africa’s Blue Economy: A Policy Handbook. Economic Commission for Africa.

This blog article is part of a series related to the Development Dialogue 2018 Conference that was recently held at the ISS.

JS Photo #1

About the author:

Johan Spamer is a researcher at ISS in the domain of multi-stakeholders initiatives (MSIs), inclusive development and innovation, specifically within the Blue Economy.

ISS hosts 16th Development Dialogue for early-stage researchers

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The Development Dialogue, an annual event organized by and for PhD researchers, this year welcomes over 80 participants. The conference theme is “Social Justice amidst the Convergence of Crises: Repoliticitzing Inequalities”. Does this sound intriguing, and do you want to know more? Perhaps you’re interested in attending some of the panels? This article provides a short summary of the conference.

The Development Dialogue (DD), an annual event for and by PhD students from across the globe, is taking place on 1 and 2 November 2018 at the ISS. It will bring together two renowned scholars and over 80 participants to share scholarly works and reflect on ideas and views around the topic “Social Justice amidst the Convergence of Crises: Repoliticizing Inequalities”.

The 16th Development Dialogue will offer PhD students and other early-stage scholars working within the broad field of Development Studies the platform and space to revisit and bring back politics into the inequality debate in particular and development discourse in general as a way of advancing the course of global social justice.

What’s in a name?

This year’s focus finds resonance in the global call to tackle inequalities, which has intensified in some parts of the world, and hence, has undermined the attainment of a dignified and just society. In view of this, this year’s DD is focusing on the repoliticization of inequalities as a pertinent and overlapping issue in the development studies debate and in struggles for social justice.

The main motivation behind this year’s topic “Social Justice amidst the Convergence of Crises: Re-Politicizing Inequalities” lies in the fact that although advances have been made in addressing various inequalities, the world is experiencing backlashes both at the national and global levels, on partial account of the emergence and/or convergence of multiple crises on the economic, environmental, humanitarian, and political fronts among others.

Moreover, responses to inequalities have largely been technocratic and simplistic, as they have repeatedly skirted around structural and institutional factors, which are at the core of these challenges. Therefore, the call to repoliticize inequalities challenges the overuse of the inequality rhetoric and demands a deeper inquiry and interrogation of the existing power relations, and the structures and institutions of (re)distribution that have engendered and sustained the disparities and divisions between and amongst societies.

It is an invitation to engage in the crucial debate on how to secure a world where the vulnerable and disadvantaged are able to obtain a fair share of the public good, claim their voice, and attain a secured sense of dignity.

What’s happening at the DD16?

Responses to the call for papers have been overwhelmingly as a good number of abstracts from PhD students and young scholars were received. We are expecting to host around 80 participants from at least 25 different countries. The scientific works to be presented will be put in fourteen different parallel panel sessions.

You can view the conference programme here

In addition to the parallel panel sessions, this year’s DD will host two renowned scholars as guest speakers: Prof. Barabara Harris-White of the University of Oxford, and Prof. Dzodzi Tsikata of the Institute of African Studies of the University of Ghana and CODESRIA, who will both present keynote addresses during which they will share very exciting views on the topic in two different plenary sessions.

Professor Barbara Harriss–White is Professor Emeritus of Development Studies and Emeritus Fellow of Wolfson College of the University of Oxford. Her research interests include the political economy of India and poverty and social welfare, particularly on the issues of destitution, disability, malnutrition, and gender-biased development in South Asia. She has a long-term interest in agrarian transformation in Southern India and has tracked the economy of a market town there since 1972. She held academic posts at the University of Oxford since 1987 until her retirement in 2011. She has been an adviser to the UK’S Department of International Development (DFID) and to seven UN organisations, as well as a trustee of the International Food Policy Research Institute and of Norway’s Institute for Environment and Development.

Professor Dzodzi Tsikata Dzodzi Tsikata is Research Professor and Director of the Institute of African Studies, (IAS) at the University of Ghana, Legon–Accra. Prior to assuming her current role, she was Professor at the Institute of Statistical, Social and Economic Research (ISSER), also at the University of Ghana. Since 2015, she has served as the President of the Council for the Development of Social Science Research in Africa (CODESRIA), after she was elected to that role at the 14th general assembly meeting which took place between 8-12 June 2015. Her academic interests include gender and development issues, as well as gender equity policies and practices.

The session of Prof. White will take place on 1 November at 09:00 in Aula B, and the session of Prof. Tsikata on 2 November at 11:00 in Aula B.

Together with the parallel panel sessions, the two plenary sessions therefore offer the intellectual platform and space where scholars can share their work with peers in a very friendly and relaxed environment. Indeed, participants can be assured that they will walk away after the DD not just with great feedback and an enhanced network of personal friends, but also with a sense of community with people coming from all over the world, and with whom they can continue to share and benefit from new ideas on development research.

 

The DD16 Organizing Committee would like to acknowledge the financial support received from the International Institute of Social Studies (ISS), the European Association of Development Research and Training Institution (EADI), the Netherlands Ministry of Foreign Affairs and the Erasmus Trustfonds. A special word of appreciation further goes to all individuals and institutional structures, particularly to the PhD community; ISS faculty members and administrative staff for the great sense of involvement, participation and support lent to the DD16 Organising Committee throughout the entire process of organizing the conference.

Authored by the DD16 Organizing Committee: Ana Lucía Badillo Salgado, Ben Yiyugsah, Emma Lynn Dadap-Cantal, Mausumi Chetia and Natacha Bruna.