This essay shall discuss two theories of development – modernisation and dependency theory (MT and DT). In this limited space, I shall narrow my analysis down to two of the staunchest representatives of each camp: Walt W. Rostow and André G. Frank. Also, because it is impossible to discuss their broad publications, I shall subject only the very core of their theories to scrutiny here. After (1) a quest for the shared assumptions of both theories, this account will discuss (2) Rostow’s idea of stages of economic growth (1959) and (3) Frank’s notion of development of underdevelopment (1966), both with their policy implications1. I will treat these mutually exclusive ideas as thesis and anti-thesis and shortly discuss (4) the direction into which a synthesis could go (and maybe has gone).
Archive for the ‘International Relations / Politics’ Category
Discussion of modernisation and dependency theory
Thursday, April 22nd, 2010Amartya Sen’s Development as Freedom – A Discussion
Thursday, March 11th, 2010‘Freedoms are not only the primary ends of development, they are also among its principle means.’ – Amartya Sen (1999, p. 10)
Amartya Sen’s quote which I am to discuss in this paper stems from his work Development as Freedom, which has been described by The Economist as ‘a personal manifesto [and] a summing up’ (Anonymous 1999). A summing up of what?
Kopftücher und Beinhaare
Thursday, January 28th, 2010Ein Artikel in der NZZ hat mich angeregt, diesen Eintrag zu schreiben. Da wurde einer Basketballspielerin in Luzern verboten, mit Kopftuch Basketballmatches zu spielen.
Die ungefühlte Wirklichkeit
Tuesday, January 26th, 2010Wir leben in einer Weltwirtschaft, was niemanden mehr überrascht. Wir fühlen aber weiterhin lokal, weil wir halt eben Menschen sind. So wird über einen Todesfall in der Nachbarschaft vielleicht monatelang geredet, über eine Schlammlawine mit mehreren Toten vielleicht zwei drei Wochen und über den Bürgerkrieg in Darfur im Sudan mit tausenden Toten gar nicht. Das Problem, das ich in diesem Essay aufzeigen möchte, ist, dass die Weltwirtschaft und die Technologie unser Handeln jeder Zeit mit der grossen Welt verbinden, wir den Konsequenzen unserer Taten aber unmöglich nachfühlen können.
How is power distributed in modern democratic states?
Thursday, December 17th, 2009“In the political system of today, inequalities in political resources remain, but they tend to be noncumulative. The political system of New Haven, then, is one of dispersed inequalities.”
“[C]ommon interpretations that depict the American or any other market-oriented system as a competition among interest groups are seriously in error for their failure to take account of the distinctive privileged position of businessmen in politics.”
These two quotes stem from the two perspectives looking at the distribution of power in modern democratic states that I chose to compare – pluralism and neopluralism. Why I did not pick elitism is a decision that will require some justification early on. After that, I will outline the two perspectives in some detail and contrast them like required. What will help this comparison is the fact that both quotes actually stem from the same scholar – Robert Dahl (Dahl 1961, 85; Dahl and Lindblom 1976, xxxvi). His change of mind will guide this comparison. Because of his and Charles E. Lindblom’s influential weight in this debate, and surely in this essay, I will work with their definition of power as power over somebody. “A” possesses power over “B” if “A” can make “B” do what “A” wants.
How do states make their foreign policy
Monday, December 14th, 2009Tackling this question has been incredibly hard because foreign policy (FP) is torn between International Relations (IR) and a genuine foreign policy analysis. It is a level of analysis problem (Singer 1961) – do we deduce from national structures or from the international system? FP is caught in between domestic and foreign politics. Here, I will choose the bottom-up approach and extrapolate from national conditions, even though this approach has allegedly ‘come to realise its limitations’ (Krieger 1993, 313) and ‘has generally produced little cumulation of knowledge or lasting impact’ (Gideon 1998, 154). I wish to be accurate about FP in this essay (micro-level) and IR theories (macro-level), almost by definition, neglect detail.
According to Webber and Smith (2002) and Brown (2001), I interpret make as formulate, not implement. So “A” might formulate a FP like ‘stronger economic ties to “B”’, but how “A” will actually implement this is another story.
I will consider FP as ‘the strategy of action developed by a state [or non-state actor] with respect to other states or international actors, aimed at achieving specific goals defined in terms of the “national interest”’ (Gregory 2009). The national interest is the ‘territorial integrity of a nation, the preservation of its values and way of life, and the promotion of a nation’s welfare’ (Gregory 2009). Let us then turn to the environment a democratic leadership would find itself in, trying to set up its FP. (more…)