Discursive development order and
local informal practices
A development project in Northern Ethiopia
Jon Harald Sande Lie
University of Oslo, Department of Social Anthropology
Thesis submitted for the Cand. Polit. degree
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Chapter 1: Introduction
The Problem
- Some Reservations
The Context and the Actors
- Afar Region and Aba'ala
- NORAD and Norwegian Development Assistance
- The Development Fund
- Mekelle University
- The Department of Agriculture
Methodological Considerations
- Various Types of Data
Preliminary Theoretical Overview
- Discourse as a System of Knowledge
- Some Critical Remarks of a Discursive Approach
- Actor Orientation and Informal Practises
- Brief Outline of Thesis
Chapter 2: Development conceptualised
The Development of "Development"
- Evolvement of Positivistic Ideas about Progress and Development
Two Grand Theories on Development
- Modernisation Theory
- Dependency Theory
The Post-Structural Approach To Development
- The Development Apparatus
- Discourse and Agency
Taking Post-Development Theory Further
- Criticism of Post-Development Theory
Interface
Summarising Remarks
Chapter 3: The formal order of the IPDP
Presentation and Representations of the IPDP and Aba'ala
- Representations of Aba'ala
Self-Presentation and Representations of the IPDP
- Nursery Activities
- Soil and Water Conservation
- Women in Development
- Water Development
- Veterinary Services
- HIV/Aids Prevention Initiatives
Where and What is the Bottom?
- 'Bottomless Development?'
- Participatory Empowerment or Cosmetic Representations?
- The introduction of HIV/Aids Prevention Initiatives
- Integrating Women in Development?
Summarising Remarks
Chapter 4: Agency and development discourse
Informality Within the Formal Structures
On the Project; Off the Record
- A Strict Plan, Flexible Implementation: The Case with the Donor Representative
- 'He knows the NORAD format': The Case with the Consultant
- The REST Case
Understanding Off the Record Informality
'What is there to Know?'
- 'Cultures of Formality'
- The 'Good' Documents of the IPDP?
- Practical Interrelatedness of Formal Structures and Informal Strategies
Summarising Remarks
Chapter 5: The IPDP: Seeing like Ethiopia?
To See Like a State
- Elements and Effects of State Intervention
The IPDP: Seeing and Acting Like a State?
- Two Elements Contested
Developmentality
NORAD Guidelines
- Representations and 'the Development Gaze'
Pastoralists on the Government's Scene
- The Ethiopian State's Encounter with the Pastoralists; a Historical Account
- Land Reforms, Producers Cooperatives and Sedentarisation
- Sedentarisation Policy in Contemporary Ethiopia
Prescribing Ethiopia
- SDPRP: A Cacophony of Interests
- Diverging Results and Effects
Summarising Remarks
Chapter 6: Globalisation and development: homogenisation or hybridisation?
Development: Cultural Flattening or Local Creativity
Development Discourse and Standardisation
- The Modern Project of Standardised Problems and Solutions
- Standardised Planning and Implementation
Agency and Hybridisation
- Reflexive Interface and Reproduction of the Formal Order
- Creativity and Hybridisation
Dualism, Irrelevant Distance and Hyperspace
- Local Agency Reproducing Global Discourse
Summarising Remarks
Chapter 7: Concluding remarks
- Some Summarising Empirical Remarks and Exemplifications
- Highlighting Some Theoretical Remarks
Bibliography
Unpublished Sources
I wish to acknowledge some of those that have contributed in making this thesis. I am particular grateful to the people associated with the Integrated Pastoral Development Project (IPDP) who not only welcomed and integrated me in their work, but also accepted to be the most important and invaluable part of this thesis; the informants.
Thomas Hylland Eriksen, Department of Social Anthropology at the University of Oslo, has offered valuable help and guidance in the process. As my supervisor, he has given fruitful comments and advices en route.
Axel Borchgrevink at NUPI (Norwegian Institute of International Affairs) has also given valuable inputs and comments to my work. His insight into anthropology and development work has been important.
I am grateful to Yayneshet Tesfay and Diress Alemu at Mekelle University, Ethiopia, for facilitating my fieldwork. The Development Fund, Norway, has also contributed in this matter.
I am grateful to the student grant holders at NUPI for interesting debates and discussions. The librarians at NUPI have been helpful. Additionally, I wish to thank the research project Transnational Flows of Concepts and Substance, at the Department for Anthropology, and particularly the students involved for interesting debates.
Despite the contributions from various people, the presented thesis and the analyses made are solely my work. I am responsible for any errors or misquotations.
Finally, and not least, I'm grateful to Elisabeth for the patience and support she has given me in course of the process.
Jon Harald Sande Lie, Oslo, January, 2004
This thesis is about discourses of development as they are featured in donor-recipient relationships within the development sector. Empirical focus is the development agents and organisations related to a Norwegian funded development project in northern Ethiopia. My argument is that development constitutes a discourse, as lessons from post-structural development critique illustrate, but that there are many discontinuities between the discourse's formal order and the local practices among recipient organisations and the actors involved. The actors involved face the gap between local knowledge and the development discourse. My combination of discursive and actor-orientated approaches to development illustrate that actors can relate reflexively to a discourse, and that post-development theory has severe shortcomings in neglecting agency and seeing development discourse as a hegemonic and homogenising system of knowledge. I argue for the plausibility of identifying a development discourse as a system of knowledge which development agents relate to in their work. As I will show, the development discourse is not irrelevant to what is going on, but it is not what is going on.
The study object is a development project in Aba'ala in the Ethiopian Afar region called the Integrated Pastoral Development Programme (IPDP). The IPDP is funded by NORAD through a Norwegian non-governmental organisation (NGO), the Development Fund (DF). Local implementers are Mekelle University (MU) and the Department of Agriculture (DoA). DF facilitates the partnership with the two Ethiopian organisations. MU and DoA are in partnership with and responsible to DF. DF, additionally, collaborates with and is responsible to NORAD, as the project's back-donor. My primary concern is DF, the Ethiopian partners, these organisations' development agents, and their comprehension of the formal order of development.
In general, the choice of theme and area dates back to 1999, when I conducted my conscientious objector duty at the Development Fund (DF). As a project assistant at DF, I helped facilitating a workshop where selected DF partners participated; amongst others Mekelle University (MU). At this workshop, the president of MU invited me to conduct my fieldwork on one of the projects MU coordinates. After I had started my post-graduate studies, taking courses in general development issues and the anthropology of development, I initiated my fieldwork. From January 2002, I spent six months in Ethiopia, more precisely in Mekelle, where MU as the coordinator of the project is situated, and in Aba'ala, Afar, where the DF funded project I study is implemented.
Anthropologists have not always been concerned with development issues, especially not applied and in practice. A seminar held in Oslo in 1982 addressed the issues of anthropologists' role in development work. The seminar approached the problem of the lack of cooperation between academics and development workers, and argued on the inclusion of anthropology, which despite 'its development-country-profile' so far had been neglected (Melhuus and Klausen, 1983). In 1989, another book (Eriksen, 1989b) addressed the problems development implementers have with including the cultural dimension in their work, in which anthropologists are to be experts. Both of these edited books argue for emphasising anthropology's knowledge and insight about 'the others', the target groups, or the 'underdeveloped' in development assistance. My approach draws more on recent literature known as the anthropology of development (as opposed to development anthropology) and post-development literature, which largely focus on 'us' and the donor side of development. Early post-development scholars see development as a western invented discourse and as a neocolonial project, mainly due to their focus on the donor's formal order and not how this order is received among local organisations and development agents. The combinations of a discursive and actor-orientated approach bridge the traditional anthropological micro-orientated focus with post-development scholars' more macro, textual and discursive approach.
This dissertation results not only from the combination of the above-mentioned circumstances, but also from the experiences and 'counter-tendencies' I've made en route. The thesis is an empirical study of a development project, but also contributes to the theoretical discussion on relations between discourse and agency, or structure and actor. The processes that have led me to this thesis mirror what Wadel describes as 'a round dance' between theory, method and data (Wadel, 1991). In my case, this round dance took place not only prior to and during my fieldwork, but also afterwards; during my empirical analysis and the writing of this thesis.
What follows in this thesis is a description and analysis of the donor-recipient relationship and its implications connected with a particular development project in Afar, Ethiopia, and the processes of how a particular knowledge is translated as it is transferred from the donor in Norway to recipients in Ethiopia. I illustrate how development cooperation and the implementation of a project function practically, and how and in what way the actual practice relates to the codified formal order of partnership cooperation and project implementation. My concern is the flow of development concepts, policy and ideas (which largely follow funds from donor to recipient) and how this is responded to locally in the encounter with the recipients. The 'development speak', or rhetoric, and policy are characterised by buzzwords, which change regularly, but get high influence as they spread and circulate fast. Among the words that characterise and infiltrate contemporary development speak are 'participation', 'bottom-up', 'community planning', 'empowerment', 'partnership', 'accountability' and 'recipient's responsibility'. These words all have in common that they address the beneficiaries of a project and their role. Thus, they also dismiss the role of the development agents involved who promote these buzzwords, and thus see themselves merely as facilitators for the participants in achieving the stipulated policy. Despite the development rhetoric and partnership idea, the donor-recipient relationship implies the transfer and flow of substances, concepts and resources. The recipient's dependence on project funds from the donor enables the donor, regardless of the formal guidelines and self-imposed rhetoric, to heavily influence the project, its goals and its policy. What is then the partnership relationship in development work about? How does it work? How do rhetoric and practice relate to each other? How are the donor's ideas and policies conceived among implementing development agents? I explore the relationship between donor and recipient, and what it implies for the constitution, realisation and implementation of the project. The partnership relation also denotes the encounter between what can be classified as different systems of knowledge, that is, the encounter between a discursive expert knowledge and local practical knowledge. I question to what extent the discrepancy in terms of knowledge affects the project's formal design and local implementation.
Drawing on lessons from the previous decade of development critique, my initial idea was to study how the development discourse shaped and was articulated in a particular project. Since one of the shortcomings of this literature is the lack of an empirical foundation, it could be interesting to study how a Western hegemonic notion of development was communicated locally and practically. Post-structural development critics largely approach development as identified in the donor countries and in various policy statements. Recipient actors and how they relate to this system are largely neglected. The most radical post-development approaches are associated with Sachs's (1995b) and Escobar's (1995) works, which postulate a total critique of development. They describe development as a uniform practice that during the last 50 years has been manifested into a massive Western hegemonic and formative discourse. They argue that the structures and knowledge that development intervention relies upon are constituted as an objective and neutral field, which give legitimacy to development intervention. These structures and the system of knowledge are manifested and reproduced in development language, practice and institutions (Nustad, 2001b).
Due to my experience in the field, I somehow had to modify my initial assumption about the relevance of the post-structural critique and the validity of a strictly discursive understanding of development. My objection to post-development scholars is their description of development as a uniform practice that is shaped by the discourse in which development agents are embedded. Their description of contemporary development discourse draw mainly on the general conception of development from the post-World War II era, and they have largely disregarded many later approaches to development practice and policy (Nustad, 2001b). Development critique among post-development scholars focuses mainly on the formal and ideational level as seen from the donor side, and consequently neglects local practices and responses.
The modifications I made are based on observations. While I acknowledge the value of seeing development as a discourse on the formal level of the relationship between donor and recipient, I emphasise the importance and value of focusing on individual actors in practical development work. Consequently, a more balanced view of development practice appears. An actor-orientated approach illustrates if and how the development discourse is translated by and articulated among development agents, how these actors relate to the formal order of development, and in what way this development knowledge is applied in constituting the project both practically and formally. To get to grips with this, I apply Norman Long's concept of interface (Long, 1989, 1992c). This implies a shift in analytical focus from the different discourses or systems of knowledge towards the various situations where these meet and become articulated. As I show, this also implies a shift from the conception of formative discourses and structures to how actors relate to them. Situations of interface generate local contextual counter-tendencies, i.e., actors' responses and methods to bridge separate systems of knowledge (Arce and Long, 2000). This will be discussed more fully in chapter three, four and six.
The relation between discourse and agency, or structure and actor, is among the classic problems within anthropology and sociology. The social phenomenological tradition emphasises discourse in the sense that the world is socially and meaningfully constructed, and can be approached hermeneutically. Berger and Luckmann (1992 [1967]) argue on the inter-relatedness of structures and actors. Actor-orientated analyses have problems in grasping the structural factors that shape agency, and structural explanations tend to be functionalist. This impasse is met by postulating that structural phenomena influence people's values and thus their choices, which again have structural and societal implications (cf. Borchgrevink, 1989: 4).
Development's formal order and organisation denote the discourse and structures of development to which actors relate in various ways. In trying to get as complete a picture as possible, one needs to take into account both the structures of development and the actors that act in relation to these structures. Approaching development as a system of knowledge that actors relate to in situations of interface enables one to draw on the insights provided by both post-development and actor-orientated scholars. This two-fold approach underlines the lesson from Barth, who is "…in no way arguing that formal organisation is irrelevant to what is happening - only that formal organisation is not what is happening" (Barth, 1993: 157). Further, Barth argues that one needs to "…trace the contexts into which people through their interpretations embed their acts, since each provides a much used, living tradition of knowledge" (ibid.: 173-174). Development discourse is one of these contexts that development agents face alongside their local 'cultural stock', i.e., the knowledge, concepts and values that actors relate to in shaping their acts and lives. The interrelatedness and situations of interface between development discourse and local practical knowledge among development agents and the implied counter-tendencies are this thesis' core themes.
This dissertation does not intend to give an exhaustive description and analysis of 'development' in general, neither concerning Ethiopia nor those projects funded directly or indirectly from Norway. It is about a particular development project in Ethiopia, funded by NORAD through a Norwegian NGO. Nevertheless, my understanding of the IPDP and the depiction and analysis of the donor-recipient relationship it implies might illustrate some general trends of development and partnership relations. I present selected cases from my fieldwork that draw on and reflect my general understanding and experiences. Despite the frames given and the narrow focus on one particular project, which holds a rather small position within the global discursive order of development, I believe this thesis can illuminate some general aspects about development projects and cooperation in general.
Though related and interesting, some themes fall outside the scope of this thesis. Most prominent, though implicitly and briefly touched upon, is an explicit analysis of power relations - both in terms of potential power structures in the donor-recipient relationship and actual practical power. In this respect, my initial plan, which is abandoned, was to see the donor-recipient relationship in terms of a gift economy. Another aspect falling outside the scope is a direct identification and analysis of various actor networks. An explicit account of both the actors' intentions and the multitude and variety of local cultural 'determinants' that make up their life-worlds fall without my range of study.
I've seen the necessity to protect my informants' name. If not because of any irregularities regarding the project's formal order, so at least due to the agreements I made with my informants in order to get the privilege of having them as informants. No names are mentioned. Apart from the cases of a more sensitive character, I refer to my informants in terms of the position they hold. In some cases, I've seen it necessary to denote actors as part of a larger group to which they belong, e.g. the board, and not their position, e.g. project manager. All organisations are denoted by their original names.
The Integrated Pastoral Development Programme1 (IPDP) is implemented in Aba'ala wereda2 in zone two of the Afar region. Below, I give a preliminary account of some relevant actors and some general contexts. The presentations are not exhaustive, but more information is provided accumulatively in future chapters. The IPDP is funded from Norway by the Development Fund (DF), and is locally run and implemented by Mekelle University (MU) and the Department of Agriculture (DoA). DoA lies in Aba'ala town, which is the centre for most project activities. MU lies in Mekelle, in the Tigray region, approximately 60 km northwest of Aba'ala. Aba'ala lies at the bottom of the escarpment area that marks the regional border between the lowland of Afar and the Tigrean highland.
The Afar region did not exist prior to the national federative formation in 1995 and Aba'ala3 was until then part of the Tigray region. The establishment of a federative formation based on ethnic boundaries was amongst the most important cases of the revolutionary side in the 1975-1991 revolution. The Ethiopian revolution in 1974 started with the overthrow of Emperor Haile Selassie, led by a group of young radical military leaders who organised their opposition through a military coordination committee known as the Derg.4 The revolution was not only a military revolution. The assumption of power was also due to a popular rising against the absolute and feudal leadership of Haile Selassie and the increasing rate of general poverty. After internal rivalry and disagreement on policy visions within the Derg, Mengistu Haile-Mariam rose as the leader and became head of the Ethiopian republic in 1975. Whereas the government of Emperor Haile Selassie received support from the US, the Soviet Union supported the military dictatorship of Haile-Mariam and the Derg.
The 1974 revolution triggered the establishment of a Tigray-organised opposition. Tigray People's Liberation Front (TPLF) was established in February 1975. TPLF, as a political opposition and guerrilla group, argued that the revolution did not imply any positive change for the Tigrean people. From being a neglected Ethiopian ethnic group during the reign of Haile Selassie, the new government succeeding from the 1974 revolution implied a shift in governmental policy towards increased oppression of the Tigrean people. TPLF argued for each Ethiopian ethnic group's right to self-justice. Together with various other ethnic based groups, most important the Eritrean People's Liberation Front (EPLF), the Tigray initiated uprising ended in 1991 with the overthrow of the Derg. Whereas EPLF pursued their goal and Eritrea became independent from Ethiopia in 1993, TPLF formed an interim coalition government, named the Ethiopian People's Revolutionary Democratic Front (EPRDF), consisting of the various victorious ethnical revolutionary parties. Their main objective of establishing a federative governmental structure based on regions demarcated by ethnic criteria was implemented in 1995 as the Federal Democratic Republic of Ethiopia (FDRE) was founded. The government has since 1991 been led by EPRDF whereof TPLF is the most influential part, and both the positions as prime minister and president are held by Tigreans.
The Development Fund (DF) has been engaged in Tigray since 1982, when they supported the Relief Society of Tigray (REST), known as TPLF's humanitarian wing, and thus indirectly supported the Tigrean revolution and guerrilla activities. DF's food and aid assistance, supported and funded by the Norwegian Ministry of Foreign Affairs, along with several other donors, was paramount to the general population of Tigray, but also meant an indirect economic and political support to the revolutionary activities. This was particular to DF since it in Ethiopia only was engaged in Tigray.
After 1991 and the end of the revolutionary uprising, DF maintained its support to REST, which now formally was independent from TPLF. Despite this, REST was still seen as a political actor: It was only working in Tigray and there were widely overlapping in terms of interests, policy and people between REST and TPLF. Today's leader of REST is a central party committee member of TPLF. From the late 1980s and until the mid-90s, DF's support to an ethnic guerrilla group and later the indirect support to the ruling party and group in Ethiopia became a problem and a weight to bear for DF. Thus, and in order to position its political neutrality by working with others than those associated with the ruling elite, DF decided to start work outside Tigray region. After assessments of area and potential partners, the Integrated Pastoral Development Programme (IPDP) was initiated in 1998 in Aba'ala Wereda in Afar region. Partners are the local Department of Agriculture (DoA) and Mekelle University (MU) from the capital of Tigray, Mekelle. As argued below, MU's practical involvement in IPDP is crucial. The president of MU, who also is the IPDP steering committee leader, is a member of TPLF's politbureau.
Regarding the initialisation of the IPDP, its first programme manager said in my first meeting with him that he still remembers a DF representative in 1998 coming 'running across the border from Eritrea with money'. That year the Eritrean government threw out largely all NGOs working in Eritrea. Thus, DF had money left on its budget adequate to initiate on a new project outside the Tigray region.
In general, Tigray region has always been rather marginal in the Ethiopian context, but after the 1991 revolution Tigray has increased its national position, largely due to positions Tigrean leaders, as representatives for the victorious revolutionary side, acquired when establishing a new government. This also enabled an increase in the channelling of resources to the region. It is illustrated in the growth in Mekelle's population, which in 1982 was approximately 20.000, and in 2003 had grown to 128.000. This growth exceeds what is natural regarding the regular Ethiopian urbanisation. Whereas the former great inequality of resources between Mekelle and Addis Ababa has decreased and Mekelle starts to become a centre by itself, a similar schism of resources is found today in the relation between Tigray and Afar. The position and role of Mekelle University vis-à-vis the Department of Agriculture serve to illustrate the contemporary division between Tigray and Afar.
In mid-1999, the estimated population of Afar was 1.188 million, of which 27.259 were found in Aba'ala wereda (Alemu, Farah and Mbuvi, 1998). Aba'ala town has 3.300 inhabitants (Kelemework, 2000). Different tabias are scattered in the eastern direction of Aba'ala town, of some are in the IPDP's target group. Previously, the areas in Aba'ala wereda were used for grazing by Afar pastoralists, but in the late 1960s Ras Mengesha Seyoum5 started commercial agriculture by clearing the wooden bush lands in the flooded areas. Since then, people, mainly from the highlands, have settled to cultivate the flooded areas (ibid.). The changes taking place made not only people from the highland settle there, but also attracted some pastoral people. Today, the majority of the people in Aba'ala town are Tigreans. Some remote tabias also have Tigrean majorities.
The classic stereotypical socio-cultural and ethnical distinctions between the Afars and the Tigreans are that while the former group is characterised as Muslims, nomadic and pastoralists, the latter group is characterised as orthodox Christians, sedentary and farmers. Some Afars living in central areas combine pastoralism and farming, and are thus denoted as agro-pastoralists. These stereotypes are merely stereotypes. In chapter three and five, I show how development agents' static and homogeneous conceptions of the ethnical characteristics and differences are important in the conceptualisation, planning and design of the project.
In general, pastoralism and farming do not represent polar opposites, but rather ideal types of economic activities along a continuum from 'pure' pastoralism to farming. Hogg (1997b) argues that most of Ethiopia's pastoral societies pursue multi-resource economies in which the balance between pastoral and non-pastoral activities is constantly shifting in response to the circumstances. Pastoralism is thus not a way of life but a set of specialised economic activities and techniques revolving around the herding and care of livestock. Pastoral communities adapt to their changing natural environment (ibid.: 2). Many pastoral communities were first informally incorporated into the Ethiopian polity during the last century, and formally only since 1995 with the establishing of the Afar regional state (Hogg, 1997a; Said, 1998; Getachew, 2001).
Aba'ala village is the hub for governmental administration of Afar zone two. It is also the centre of most of the IPDP's project activities for the various target groups living scattered around the village. The village has experienced a rapid growth and development. In 1999 electricity and tap-water were introduced to selected parts of the town. A new and passable road connects Aba'ala to the Addis Ababa - Mekelle/ Asmara road. Thus, the traditional Thursday marked, which previously only attracted caravans and people from adjacent areas, now attracts merchantmen from the highland who take advantage of the Aba'ala market, which is cheaper than markets in the highland. This exposes the Afars to external actors.
NORAD and Norwegian development assistance
The Norwegian Agency for Development Cooperation, NORAD, is an implementing agency under the Norwegian Ministry for Foreign Affairs. In the formulation of development assistance the Ministry makes policy decisions while NORAD works out the rules and regulations for implementation. Unless otherwise specified, NORAD's and the Norwegian Government's policy can therefore be taken to be the same (Saugestad, 2001). Though financing "…initiatives and efforts prioritised by the development countries themselves, NORAD invests in human rights, democracy, environment, economic growth, education, health, welfare and equality".6 Aiming at policy coherence, NORAD distributes funds for development assistance in three channels. These channels are bilateral, that is, directly state-to-state support, multilateral, i.e., assistance given to and directed by various international organisations, and through civil society and NGOs. My primary concern is the latter channel. NORAD states that civil society is "…the formal and informal networks and organisations which operate and are found in the space between the state, the family and market and Norwegian NGOs are encouraged to support this sector of society" (NORAD, 2003b: i). Not only does NORAD promote policy coherence among its three channels, it also strives to cohere with international organisations and treaties regarding development in which Norway is engaged. I address the complex issue of policy coherence in several chapters, and most notably in chapter five and six. NORAD provides Norwegian applicant-NGOs with 90% of their funds based on the applicants' 10% share, which the applicants must collect from private donors to illustrate their role as representatives of civil society, that they are non-governmental and rely upon popular involvement. An implication is NORAD's power to delineate and affect applicants' policy, despite NORAD only is supposed to support 'initiatives and efforts prioritised by the development countries themselves'. The issue of participatory approaches in terms of policy choice, project planning and design is among my central concerns, in addition to the ambiguity between development rhetoric and practice. A central ambiguity of development rhetoric is between the widely acknowledged ideas of participation and policy coherence.
The Development Fund (DF) is a Norwegian NGO and holds the role as donor to the IPDP. In 2001 DF received 31.1 million NOK from NORAD, which places DF as the eleventh largest recipient of NORAD funds allocated to Norwegian voluntary organisations (Liland and Kjerland, 2003: 250). DF states that since its start-up in 1978 it " …has been in the vanguard of progressive thinking, with was then the radical vision that poverty is best fought by aiming to enable people to help themselves",7 an idea that today is widely, if not universally, acknowledged within the development sector. DF's primary goal is to contribute to combat poverty and give support to marginalised groups in rural areas in selected countries. DF's three priority areas are food security, productive efforts and civil society, all based on the condition of environmental security and sustainable resource use. Small farmers are DF's primary target group. DF supports projects in a variety of countries in Asia, Latin America and Africa, hereof Ethiopia and the IPDP. DF works only through partner organisations in the respective target areas, and has no personnel stationed abroad. DF's partners in Ethiopia are Relief Society of Tigray (REST), Women Association of Tigray (WAT)8 and Mekelle University (MU), all situated in Tigray. Regarding the IPDP, DF collaborates with MU and the Department of Agriculture (DoA). DoA lies in Afar. My general experience from these partners is that DF is reckoned as a highly appreciated, good, stable, engaged and serious partner.
Initially established as a College of Dryland Agriculture Resources in 1993, this academic institution gained status as University in 1997. The activities of Mekelle University (MU) largely rely upon business assets or funds from external donors. NORAD is among several governmental organisations that support MU. Additionally MU collaborates in, implements and coordinates a number of development project funded by various NGOs, including DF and the IPDP.
MU plays the key role in the IPDP despite formally being equal with DoA. The formal role of MU in the IPDP is largely one of coordination, technical back-up and provision of technical personnel exceeding the local staff's abilities. MU is responsible of providing DF with financial mid-term and annual reports.9 The IPDP project manager, who is an employee at MU, performs all direct communication with DF. MU controls the accountings of the project and thus makes the disbursements of salaries and other costs related to the project. MU holds the project car which is used by the manager to travel between Mekelle and Aba'ala. MU holds the most central and influential position of the IPDP board and steering committee, i.e., the chairman.10 The board rarely meets, because of difficulty of communication, restricted time-budgets and the spatial scattering of board members. Practically, MU's role and influence over IPDP exceed the formal power and responsibility initially assigned to MU, since MU holds four board members (including the chairman and the project manager), while also managing the accountings and the communication with DF. Many decisions are taken by MU representatives without conferring with other board members or their seemingly equal partner, DoA, despite "Zone 2 Department of Agriculture of the Afar Regional [sic] is the major partner of the programme".11
As the major 'partner of the IPDP' "[a]ll programme activities are planned, implemented and closely supervised by the staff of the Department of Agriculture at zone and Wereda levels. The department is also responsible for technical support of the project. The project's site manager is seconded from the Department".12 Other local offices are also engaged in IPDP under the supervision of DoA: Zone and Wereda Administrative Council, Zone 2 Women's Affairs Office and Wereda Health Office. These institutions collaborate with DoA in the practical implementation of selected project activities ascribed to their respective area of responsibility in Aba'ala.
The Department of Agriculture (DoA) holds office in the outskirts of Aba'ala town among a cluster of governmental and regional administrative offices. DoA has difficulties in implementing its formally ascribed tasks. DoA staff often complain about their subordinate position in the IPDP, but also acknowledge their constraints in terms of lack of knowledge on project management, their high illiteracy rate, and thus their difficulties in communicating directly with DF. In addition is the turnover rate of qualified personnel high among DoA staff, who rather want to go back to the urban highland where they were educated to work. The impression given is often that they feel as recipients towards MU, while they see DF and DF's project coordinator, who visits Aba'ala a maximum of three times a year, as their friends and assistants in their problems with MU. The difficulties DoA faces in executing its formal obligations are not purely due to internal factors, but also to the position MU has in the IPDP and towards DF, which, as argued above, exceeds its formal obligations.
In practice the DoA functions to bridge the gap between MU, the project activities and the project's beneficiaries. The people of Aba'ala are, as Afars in general, sceptical of external actors (as MU and DF) and change. The DoA's role is crucial in practical implementation regarding the communication of the project to the beneficiaries, to get local acceptance for the project and its various activities, and the involvement of external actors.
I aim to study development agents and their relations to both the formal order of development, to the donor and the implications of this relationship in project implementation. Therefore, my main study object becomes the IPDP project staff at MU, because they hold key positions in the project in terms of implementation, planning, communication, and general project management. Nevertheless, I do draw on some material from DoA and its relationship with MU, DF, and the project in general. Some other organisations are also relevant to my study. They will be presented as they emerge in this thesis. The above-mentioned organisations are the most important ones for the IPDP and my study, and thus represent my main frames for gathering data.
Development in general is a huge industry with a multitude of actors and organisations involved on various levels. I will limit my study area to the IPDP and the various actors involved in the project on various levels. The organisations mentioned above, the actors they employ and the various IPDP project documents demarcate the field. The decrease of scale by focusing primarily on the IPDP also reduces the complexity of my field. The concept of scale implies a connection to something larger, and my local empirical data thus say something about the larger structures and discourse of development in which my field is embedded. The IPDP design is not merely a result of the relations between donor, recipients and beneficiaries, but draws in many ways on a global development discourse. The development discourse is depicted in the next chapter. Occasionally I also draw on material not directly aligned with the IPDP. Most of this material relates to DF and its other partners in Ethiopia. I use written sources from the IPDP, but also other written documents and literature to illustrate the broader system IPDP is a part of, such as the Ethiopian PRSP13 process, the role of the Development Association Committee (DAC) in stipulating policy, and NORAD. I've also had three meetings with representatives of the Norwegian embassy in Addis Ababa. It all serves to give a broader picture of DF, the donor-recipient relationship, and features common to the IPDP which all contribute to illustrate the larger system of development which the IPDP is part of.
I've used several methods to collect various types of data in order to understand if, how and to what extent development agents on various levels are embedded in and how they relate to various social practices, organisations and systems of knowledge. The numerous collected data and the methods used to gain them are characterised by what Denzin calls data and methodological triangulation (Denzin, 1989). The concept of triangulation denotes the combination of multiple strategies and methodologies in the study of the same phenomenon with the purpose of providing the researcher with more reliable and unbiased data. Denzin states that triangulation can occur on four basic levels, i.e., on data, the investigator, the theory and the methodology. I have applied data and methodological triangulation. I was unable to apply investigator triangulation, since this is an independent study and product. The various approaches are more a result of a round dance between theories, methodology and data (Wadel, 1991) than something that I strove for in advance of the fieldwork. As Denzin writes, there's no magic in triangulation. It only makes the researcher aware that different approaches yield different pictures and slices of reality. Triangulation is a way for anthropologists to cope with the problems of subjectivity, biases and self-reflection.
Studies of development projects and organisations from within are scarce. This thesis is, however, such a study and was rendered possible as I, in 1999, when working in the Development Fund (DF), was invited by the president of Mekelle University (MU) to do my field study on one of the projects MU facilitates. Before leaving for Ethiopia, I requested and received a letter of recommendation from MU that said I was invited for six months to conduct my field study. I got admittance and was integrated into the IPDP due to my initial invitation and because I was, in the beginning, still associated with the Development Fund (DF), since one of DF's employees helped me in establishing contacts. I explicitly stated that this was my own academic project, independent of DF and NORAD. Consequently, some high officials and the administrative staff of MU became sceptical to my presence, and asked 'what I had to offer them'. After explaining about my project and referring to the invitation letter, I was again admitted. Later, these initial problems were paid no attention to and I was included in the parts of the MU staff working on development projects, and especially those working with IPDP, DF and NORAD. I many cases, I was also seen as a resource, as I was regularly called into the office of a senior staff member at MU. He would ask me to inform him about e.g. NORAD's role in IPDP, how to apply for a PhD through NORAD's quota programme, to update his anti-virus software (437 new viruses found!), or to teach him to pronounce the name of an employee at the Norwegian embassy who he was supposed to address in a meeting, a name composed of three of the Norwegian letter Ø.
The initial formal problems were disregarded by those who later were to become my key-informants. These are the IPDP project manager, two IPDP board members and the first IPDP coordinator, who all are employees at MU. Other informants are the general staff, board members and the network associated with the IPDP in particular. Another complementing group of informants are those working in MU and other organisations on development projects, but not the IPDP. The IPDP project manager and one of the board members, who previously lived in Aba'ala but moved back to Mekelle as the project he was running was to be phased out, are the most important persons in the practical implementation of the IPDP. They both seemed genuinely to appreciate my presence and my interest in the IPDP and their work. To them, I also was a person with knowledge about the Norwegian model and NORAD, which they had little experience with. They were also of key importance to help me with transport between Aba'ala and Mekelle. I was allowed to join in on their trips to Aba'ala, and as they went there about once a weak each, I regularly had the opportunity to visit the project area and observe how they worked and related to the beneficiaries and the Department of Agriculture (DoA). I thus became familiar with some of DoA's staff and the local field manager. All together, I stayed approximately 65 days in Aba'ala. The 25 nights I spent there were largely because I conducted a household survey. The many trips back and forth to Aba'ala, a one-way drive estimated to around 1.5 hours, were an imperative source of information, as I had the chance to spend time alone with my informants. The car became not only a means of transportation, but also a mode of inquiries and a marker of "conversational communities" (cf. Gudeman and Rivera, 1990). Nevertheless, my base was Mekelle, as almost all my informants lived there. My key informants were also crucial in providing me with various project documentation and background information of the IPDP.
All my informants, except those living in Afar, spoke English. English is also used as the 'project language' and to communicate with the donor. Consequently, both my informants and I used our second language. Obviously, this implies various constraints regarding the actors' translation from Tigrinya to English, and my translation from Norwegian to English. Nevertheless, the possibility of speaking English was crucial for my fieldwork, as it would have been difficult and time-consuming for me to obtain sufficient skills in Tigrinya or Amharic. Despite the problems of rationality and translation, which increase when using a second language, English was the natural choice as it was our common denominator in terms of language and thus had fewest negative implications regarding translation. If needed, my informants assisted me in translating from the local language. Whenever I was present, the IPDP staff generally talked English.
My collected data can be divided into qualitative and quantitative data. The qualitative data is based on observations of the general project work which I occasionally participated in, different forms of interviews (structured, semi-structured and unstructured), narratives, discussions and through ordinary conversations with my informants. Of a qualitative matter are also the various written sources and documents I've used. The qualitative data can be divided into formal and informal, depending on how and where they are acquired. Interviews with a tape recorder present, observations of formal meetings and workshops, and documents are of a formal manner. Informal qualitative data was collected in interviews without a tape recorder, in daily speech, regular observations in various settings, observations made as I participated in project work, and in discussions with the involved actors. There are no clear-cut boundaries between formal and informal data. I frequently confronted my informants in informal settings with data obtained in formal settings. I early abandoned formal interviews with a structured questionnaire and a tape-recorder, since my initial assumptions were not reflected in what the informants wanted to talk about; and rather I decided to follow the loops and let my informants elaborate freely when collecting data. Having the privilege to follow the project manager in largely all his tasks that concerned the IPDP, I received access to interactional data with and between MU employees engaged in the IPDP, the DoA, the beneficiaries, DF (which during my fieldwork visited its partners in Mekelle and Aba'ala), and the beneficiaries. I mostly observed, but sporadically I was also assigned to participate in project management, a workshop, and planning.
Various project documents, (i.e. strategy plans, reports, applications, terms of reference, communication, partnership agreements) are also an important intake for information about the project, since they constitute the formal order of the project and the partnership agreement. Project documents stipulate what has been done, what is to be done, and how to do it. Project documents constitute the formal order of development as a social discourse that different development agents produce and relate to in their project implementation. The formal order of the IPDP, which I present in chapter three, is important since formal institutions form a context that appears as an unproblematic truth underlying development agents' actions. The IPDP's formal order is codified in project documents. Eduardo Archetti, on the importance of also including texts in the study, argues that "…social discourses are also embedded in, or expressed through, writing" and states that one must identify how texts are produced and consumed (Archetti, 1994: 11). Since project documents stipulate the IPDP's formal order, it easily enables to distinguish "…between what people say they do, what they ought to do, and what they in fact do" (Hendry and Watson, 2001: 4).
My quantitative data are more questionable. I conducted a household survey of 58 samples with the objective of identifying the socio-cultural changes that might have taken place since the implementation of the IPDP. In retrospect, I see severe shortcomings in my survey, primarily due to my lack of knowledge about how to make it. Yet, the survey shows some general trends and provides some useful statistical material. The main profits of the household survey are that it can be seen as a personal exercise in how to make and collect this type of material, as well as giving me access to various people, places and stories. I employed a translator when conducting the household survey.
My general theoretical approximation lies at the juncture between a discursive and actor-orientated approach. More precisely, it addresses the connections between development discourse and development agents. The development discourse is depicted in chapter two, the formal order of the IPDP is presented in chapter three, while in chapter four and six I elaborate around development agents' relationship to this discourse. Below, a general theoretical account is given of the concepts of discourse and actor-orientated approach.
The concept of discourse, as applied within the social sciences, denotes the interrelation between knowledge, meaning and power, i.e., a system of knowledge or meaning that is shared by various people (Svarstad, 2001: 3). A combination of a discursive and actor-orientated approach allows us to identify various actors' relations to a system of knowledge, illustrating how actors might draw on, challenge or alternate between different discourses. Imposed discourses might be challenged by the actors' cultural stock and local practical knowledge. Discourses, as the implicit, obvious and unspoken conditions for communications can be challenged by actors' agency and their opinions, i.e., what is intentional, explicit and debatable. Focusing on actors and their relations to the development discourse, one observes interplay between different systems of knowledge. Norman Long's concept of interface denotes the critical point of intersection between different systems of knowledge. Situations of interface are articulated through actors (Long, 1989; Long and Long, 1992).
Discourse as a system of knowledge
Neumann defines discourse as a
"…system for the formation of statements and practises, that by inscribing itself into institutions and appearing as more or less normal, constitutes reality for its bearers and has a certain degree of regularity in an array of relationships" (Neumann, 2001b: 18, my translation).
The arrays of relationships that are of my concern are generally those aligned to contemporary and historical development issues, that is, the development discourse's formation, and particularly how it is reflected in the IPDP and its implied organisations. The demarcation of a discourse implies identifying the regular and systematic collection of statements and practices (Hammer, 2001: 8). My field is demarcated as the development sector, and more precisely the IPDP and adjacent elements. An institution is a symbol-based program that regulates social interaction. The institutionalisation of a discourse implies the formalisation of statements and practices, through rules of formation, which bearers of that particular discourse both represent and reproduce through their agency. A discourse refers not only to oral and written statements, but also to aggregates of social practices (Kårhus, 1992; Kårhus 2001).
Foucault proposes a discourse that is perceived as insignificant by its bearers, and emphasises the structuralising power a particular discourse has over its bearers through the discourse's conditions of existence, rules of formation and procedures of exclusion. "The discourse can appear as insignificant, but the prohibitions it is affected by reveal quite early and quite fast its connections with the desire and the power" (Foucault, 1999 [1970]: 9, my translation). The rules of formation lead to regularity in statements and practices aligned with the discourse. Actors' expressions that do not reflect or relate to the existing discursive order are sanctioned by exclusion. The actors' self-disciplinarian and self-regulating normalisation of statements and practices lead to a strengthening and reproduction of the established discursive order.
Discourse analysis takes as its primary concern to understand the processes of discursive formation. Foucault's method in revealing and exploring discourse is to identify the discourse's archaeology and genealogy. The genealogical approach identifies the history of the discourse and enables the researcher to see the present discourse in terms of the past to discover the discourse's historical conditions of validity. The archaeological approach explores how present discourses regulate and distribute its bearers' statements and practices through certain rules of formation. Foucault's main occupation is to identify the historical and contemporary discursive conditions, and how they are articulated and manifested. Foucault is not directly interested in the discourse's originator, since a discourse "…comprises a sort of anonymous system that is available to those who want or can operate it without its meaning or validity necessarily being connected to the discourse's originator" (ibid.: 19, my translation). My conception of discourse is not as exclusively reserved for selected groups, but as a system of knowledge that can be shared, learned and applied by others.
For those embedded in a discourse the discourse is the reality. For the discourse analyst this reality is perceived through its representations (Neumann, 2001b), or metonyms (Kårhus, 1992). A representation, or metonym, is a piece that stands for a larger whole in which the piece itself is a part of (ibid.: 113) and appears between the physically given world and our perception of it (Neumann, 2001b: 33). Discourse analysts are concerned with epistemological questions, i.e., how and why things appear as they do and how we have a particular knowledge about the world we live in. Identifying the representations which a discourse relies upon say something about the particular discursive realm and how the discourse functions. In chapter three I present and challenge different representations of the IPDP as they appear in the project documents.
Some critical remarks of a discursive approach
Many academics engaged in development issues have during the last two decades been influenced by and largely adopted Foucault's notion of discourse. Known as post-development theoreticians, these scholars' development critique takes advantage of seeing development as a discourse - "…as a system of knowledge, technologies, practices and power relationships that serve to order and regulate the objects of development" (Lewis et al., 2003: 545). This view is associated with, amongst others, Sachs (1992b), Ferguson (1994) and Escobar (1995). My general concern of discourse analysis, which echoes my critique of post-development, is the validity and the area of application ascribed to it and its ability to grasp the entirety and complexity of what is analysed. It's hardly a novel anthropological insight, but it echoes my argument that no single theoretical approach manages to grasp the full complexity of what is described. Discourse analysts in general, and post-development scholars in particular, largely avoid other theoretical approaches. I am critical of their conception of discourse as a monolithic, hegemonic and homogenising system of knowledge that neglects and undermines humans as reflective individuals and rather see them as subordinate and merely bearers of a discourse. Discourses, regarded as obvious conditions for communication, can be questioned under particular circumstances; they can be revealed to be constructions and therefore changeable. Not only conflicts between discourses, but also challenges to the very discourses themselves can occur as the implicit, may be transformed and thus appear as explicit and intentional opinions. I see discourse as a system of knowledge that is maintained and spread by its bearers, but the reception of this discourse among those encountering it has no a priori defined outcome. No discourse is hegemonic, and what happens in the encounter between a discourse and other systems of knowledge is an empirical question. Too rigid a conception of discourse necessarily closes out certain ways of thinking and viewing the world, while privileging others (cf. Lewis et al., 2003). As knowledge is distributed, it is also contextualised. The development discourse, as analysed from the donors' side, is not necessarily what happens locally among recipients. Transformations and translations occur as the realms of donor and recipient encounter. I focus on actors as bearers and articulators of knowledge. This enables me to identify the processes that take place in the knowledge encounter. In my case, the development discourse represents a system of knowledge development agents in various ways relate to in constituting their reality.
I acknowledge post-development scholars' identification of a development discourse, but I disagree on the exclusive formative power ascribed to the discourse. To assume that the formal order of development, as codified in project and policy documents (which is the primary concern of post-development scholars), is identical to the local implementation and practice is not correct. It attaches too much faith to formative structures and knowledge. This is among the central points in this thesis. To study the reception and the local application of the development discourse, an actor orientation is necessary. What becomes prevalent is the disjuncture and slippage between the formal discursive order and local practices.
Actor orientation and informal practices
The inclusion of an actor-orientated approach to development issues emerged because my initial theoretical and methodological approaches, largely affected by post-development theories, did not resonate with my empirical findings, nor with my post-field review and analysis. I acknowledge post-development scholars' identification of the development discourse, but I see this discourse as merely one amongst many systems of knowledge in which development agents relate to, form and are formed by. There are many discourses, or systems of knowledge. Some coexist, some overlap, some oppose each other. By including an actor-orientated approach, it becomes possible to see how various systems of knowledge are affected when challenged and encountered by others. These situations of interface are articulated via various actors.
Traditional actor analysis gives primary attention to the involved actors' intentions, motivation and to some extent see individual as purely homo economicus who pursue their own goals without regard to these being of an egoistic or altruistic kind (cf. Barth, 1993; Long and Long, 1992). I am not directly concerned with identifying various actors' intentions. My actor orientation is more a matter of where focus is put to gain data and analyse how a development discourse is received, applied, translated or rejected, since a discourse necessarily needs to be articulated through someone or something. What becomes prevalent is the difference between formal structures and informal practices, or the discontinuity between formal discursive order and local practical knowledge.
The actor-orientated approach not only helps to open up black boxes of formal, institutional and discursive developments, but also opens up and nuances post-development theoreticians' depiction of the development discourse. An actor-orientated approach offers a possibility to understand how meanings associated with development are "…produced, contested and reworked in practice - and thus to illuminate the multiple significances that the term holds for actors involved in the development process" (Lewis et al., 2003). In order to understand these processes, it is important to understand the broader picture of development, a picture offered by post-development scholars, and how the various organisations involved function formally and practically. The understanding of development as a discourse relies mostly on formal sources. What is regularly prominent in this field, is the discontinuity between formal organisation and the many informal practices that oppose but at the same time relate to the formal structure of development. An actor-orientated approach illustrates the slippage between the formal order and organisation of development, and the local informal practices that result as coping mechanisms towards the imposed formal order. I aim to provide an ethnographic study on how particular texts are produced and consumed by development organisations and agents, how they relate to or feed into a development discourse and how these influence and interact with project practices as communicated by local development agents. In many respects, this mirrors the classic question on the relationship between the map and the terrain. This much said, we are now ready to embark on the analysis proper, after first briefly outlining the thesis.
In next chapter, I shall present the development discourse and give an account of some main theoretical approaches to development. The chapter is not merely of theoretical value. It also illustrates the context of my general approach, and shows the plausibility of having a discursive approach to development. Thus, the chapter also has empirical value.
Chapter three shows the formal order of the IPDP and the representations that the project relies upon. The formal order of the IPDP not only stipulates the project activities, but also how to design, plan and implement the project. The socio-cultural descriptions of Aba'ala and Afar in the project documents, which formally are the knowledge the project is based on, are also challenged. Project documents present the project's components, target group and area simplistically and as legible units constituting the project.
Chapter four presents three different cases which all serve to illustrate various informal strategies arising as local counter-tendencies in the encounter between the formal structures of development and local practical knowledge. The chapter shows that what is perceived as formal and informal are interrelated, and that informality and reflexivity towards the development discourse can be as much an attribute of local development agents as of the donor representatives.
In chapter five, I give an account of the process of planning and the effects produced. In giving an account of Ethiopia's government's approach to pastoral people, I show how state and NGO intervention in many respects rely on comparable elements and produce similar effects.
In chapter six, I question what the situations of interface lead to. Do the many encounters between donors' and recipients' knowledge represent a process of homogenisation or local creativity? Drawing on previously presented material, this question is debated.
This chapter presents the theoretical framework of the thesis. It also argues for the plausibility of approaching development as a discourse. My general view is on 'those who are to do the development, and not those supposed to be developed'.14 Consequently it is necessary to depict the general system of knowledge that development agents relate to, and the history of this discourse. In retrospect, the last 50 years are characterised by a rhetoric that has altered between a wide range of approaches, methods and policies to development, which all have substituted the former either due to lack of results or because of political alterations. Post-development scholars, in seeing development as a discourse, argue that these new ideas never managed to free themselves from the established development practice and that despite the rhetorical changes the old practices and approaches are reproduced.
Post-development, which dismisses the idea of development, represents a post-structural discursive approach to development and seeks to explain why so many development projects seem to fail by focusing on the underlying premises of development and the unintended side-effects it produces. According to post-developers, the development discourse represents a monolithic, hegemonic and homogenising system of knowledge with a high degree of formative power that prevails over actors involved. The discourse's structures of power captivate the agency of the actors that relate to the discourse. Since no approach manages to explain a phenomenon in its entirety, and post-development largely neglects human agency, an actor-orientated approach is included and combined with a post-structural discursive approach in trying to give a broader account of how development functions practically. This is done through Norman Long's conception of interface, which has a primary focus on processes occurring in the encounter between different types of knowledge, e.g. a development discourse and local practical knowledge. The concept of interface is fruitful for envisioning the interplay between structure and agency because it acknowledges the "…notion of multiple realities and arenas of struggle where different life-world and discourses meet" (Long, 1992b: 271). Initially, development discourse is presented since it constitutes one of the systems of knowledge to which development agents relate.
Post-development scholars usually argue that the concept of 'development' as we know it today got manifested in the last part of the 1940s, i.e., after World War II.15 The US was in rapid progress, and Europe, which was in ruins, received help from the US to rebuild itself. This was manifested through the Marshall help. The 'Iron Curtain' that divided the former allied parts into a 'democratic west' and 'communistic east' triggered the idea and need of aid and intentional development as a means to secure the US's, and later the West's geopolitical interests by building up partners and future allies initially in Europe and later around the world. Aid and economic support were a means to establish and secure political interests. Development assistance was to become an important tool in the superpowers' ideological and geopolitical struggle.16 The initiation of development assistance and aid was not merely a moral concern of poverty alleviation in general, but also a means to spread scientific advances and technical progress to make underdeveloped areas grow economically so that, from the point of view of the US, the underdeveloped areas would not fall under communistic influence. This was manifested through the inauguration speech of US President Truman in 1949.17 The Truman Doctrine's Point Four created master metaphors within the development sector (Porter, 1995). The division of the world into a democratic west and communistic east was now supplemented with another axis that separated the developed north from the underdeveloped south. When tracing the genealogy of development discourse, post-development scholars ascribe its origin to the post-WW2 era and Truman's speech. Nevertheless, the concept of development as we know it today dates further back.
Evolvement of positivistic ideas about progress and development
The manifestation of the idea of development in the post-WW2 era drew largely on already exiting notions of development and progress. In the 17th and 18th century, questions related to development rose. The term development, which originates from biology, was conceived in the social sphere as "…the transformation that moves towards an ever more perfect form" (Esteva, 1992: 8). The era of industrialisation led not only people to experience rapid growth and progress but also involved an issuant division between rich and poor and the rise of a class-divided society. This largely occurred in the urban areas and exposed poor and rich groups to each other, and poverty became defined as a problem for society in general. In combination with the Era of Enlightenment's belief in science and rationality, this led to the rise of theories and methods to intervene in the society to help those perceived as poor (cf. Nustad, 2003a).
In Doctrines of Development (1996), Cowen and Shenton express that there are two different ways of perceiving the concept of development, that is, development as a latent and immanent process, and development as an intentional directed process, both of which date back to the Enlightenment Era. Development as a latent and immanent process is associated with Adam Smith, who argued that in order to disengage the immanent processes of development, the social and structural constraints preventing this had to be removed. The understanding of development as an intentional process differs from Smith's conception, in terms of how humans are understood. Whereas Smith argued that the aggregate of individuals' free moral choices would benefit society, those seeing development as an intentional process argued that this process needed to be directed and guided by someone, i.e., society's managers in accordance to certain stipulated intentions. The latter view, often associated with the Saint-Simonians, rejected the idea of progress as a natural non-intended process, and rather proposed an idea about development as an active interference in society by its managers (Cowen and Shenton, 1996; Nustad, 2001a). August Comte brought these ideas further in his promotion of rationality, planning and science.
Nustad argues that the conception of development as a process leading towards an ever more perfect form implies that someone necessarily needs to know about this form. These are also to intervene and intentionally direct society's development. A consequence is that despite certain groups (the poor and the rich) are living in the same spatial and temporal society, those defined as objects for development by society's managers are conceived as living in another time, since they do not have the same conditions of living as the managers. Nustad calls this phenomenon temporal segregation - that inequality in standard of living is explained by stating that the poor are at another evolutionist stage of development or history than the rich. Temporal segregation denotes a unilinear perception of history, where societies, or groups within a society, are placed along a two-dimensional axis leading from 'not-developed' to 'developed'. This implies that poverty is not explained with reference to contemporary political relations, but by stating that societies exist isolated from each other at different developmental stages (Nustad, 2003a).
The Era of Enlightenment also represented a fracture between a sacred and secular perception of time and history, which underlines the concept of temporal segregation. The rejection of God's omnipresence turned into great emphasis put on man's contribution to history and society. This is illustrated with the concept of travelling. What previously had taken the form of pilgrimage was now conceived as a refinement-travel for the bourgeoisie of the 17th century, which represented a journey in time and space (ibid.: 31). In 1800, J.M. Degèrando wrote that "the philosophical traveller, sailing to the ends of the earth, is in fact travelling in time; he is exploring the past; every step he takes is the passage of an age" (cited in Nustad, 2003a: 31). What constitutes the notion of temporal segregation went from being a characteristic of internal inequalities to become projected on external and remote societies and countries. The increase in scale also implied an increase in effect. Relations between rich and poor people, and later developed and underdeveloped countries were understood as temporal relations, and underlines what Nustad calls temporal segregation.
The ideas on how to cope with and solve the internal inequalities of a society were also later to be projected externally on other countries and societies. Poverty and inequalities were initially seen as a local and national problem of European capitalistic societies, but when European nations started to explore and engage in colonialism outside Europe, the problems of poverty and inequality were identified there. The conception of European inequality now became the characteristic of other remote and foreign societies, seen in relation to Europe. Not only were the same characteristics adopted, but also the same means to cope with and solve the problems in the colonies were adopted. The division between rich and poor in various European societies was now applied as a distinction between Europe and the colonies. Helping these poor nations, among other things, became a legitimisation of the colonial powers' presence. The understanding of development as possible to intentionally direct through intervention was applied. The same notion was later largely pursued by development organisations in the post-colonial era. This conception of development is reflected in post-WW2 development policy and strategies.
It is argued that the 'invention' of underdevelopment, the conceptualisation of somebody as 'underdeveloped', and thus the Project of Development was initiated by US President Truman's speech of inauguration, 20th January 1949.18 This speech is viewed as the start of a new era, a particular historical period (Sachs, 1992a), the era of development (Esteva, 1992).19 The speech presented grand ambitions; to give all the people of the world what societies characterised as 'developed' had: better conditions of living, democracy, rapid growth in material production which coincides with a high degree of industrialisation and urbanisation (Escobar, 1995). Before Truman's inauguration speech, US Senator Herbert Hoover, at Truman's request, made a tour of 38 countries to assess global food supplies and to see how surpluses and intervention from the US might be deployed in order to help the 'underdeveloped'. His depiction of these poverty-struck countries was devastating. Hoover ended his address to the American people by saying: "But we can save these people from the worst - if we will" (cited in Hancock, 1989: 70). Truman's doctrine about development, which in many ways builds on Hoover's report, states:
We must embark on a bold new program for making the benefits of our scientific advances and industrial progress available for the improvement and growth of underdeveloped areas. More than half of the people of the world are living in conditions approaching misery. Their food is inadequate, they are victims of disease. Their economic life is primitive and stagnant. Their poverty is a handicap and a threat both to them and more prosperous areas. For the first time in history, humanity possesses the knowledge and the skill to relieve the suffering of these people … our imponderable resources in the technical knowledge are constantly growing and are inexhaustible … The old imperialism - exploitation for foreign profit - has no place in our plans … Greater production is the key to prosperity and peace. And the key to greater production is a wider and more vigorous application of modern scientific and technical knowledge (cited in Porter, 1995: 66-67).
Escobar (1995) understands this vision not only as an American idea, but also as a result of the general post-war conditions. Despite Point Four intentionally being a public relation exercise (Brigg, 2002: 424), post-development scholars regard it as the initiation to the era of development. Three crucial elements arose from this speech, which affected development thought in general and modernisation theory in particular: First, it generated a conceptual division of the world into two separate and distinguished entities, the developed and underdeveloped. Nustad states that "[d]evelopment colonised the world by ordering in into 'us' and 'them', 'the developed' and 'underdeveloped' (1998: 42). Kate Manzo applies Jacques Derrida's conception of logocentrism in describing ethnocentrism as one of many manifestations of modernistic procedures. This term describes a disposition to impose hierarchy when encountering familiar and uncritically accepted dichotomies, e.g. north and south, developed and underdeveloped, modern and traditional, core and periphery, etc. (1991). In such dichotomised terms, the latter is understood in relation to what constitutes the former. "The first term in such oppositions is conceived as a higher reality, belonging to the realm of logos, or pure and invariable presence in need of no explanation. The other term is then defined solely in relation to the first" (1991: 8). Secondly, Truman's Point Four says something about development: He largely defines what developed is and how to become developed. To become "like us", in the sense of having prosperity and peace, is reached through "…a wider and more vigorous application of modern, scientific and technical knowledge". Simultaneously, Point Four underscores the idea of development as an intentional directed process, and that the "underdeveloped areas" will become developed through application of Western elements. Thirdly, Truman says something about who is to do the development, that it is "We" that "must embark on a bold new program" because "humanity possesses the knowledge and skill to relieve the suffering…" in order to make our "…progress available for the improvement and growth of underdeveloped areas".20 Among the power-effects of Truman's speech are that it depoliticised the relations between rich and poor and consequently reproduced the largely immanent temporal segregation of the development concept. Simultaneously it stipulated how and who to bring about development to the underdeveloped (Nustad, 2003a), thus producing a room for intervention by external development agents. This established top-down technocratic approach was later manifested in Rostow's work about modernisation theory.
Scholars regard Point Four as the initiation of modernisation theory, which was to become the most influential and famous paradigm within development, especially represented by the North American economist Walt Rostow (Nustad, 2001a; Escobar, 1995; Gardner & Lewis, 1996). Development was perceived as a natural process that had to be emancipated and directed by those already developed through their intervention with the aim of speeding up the process. Development was perceived as a uniform process and was supposed to be the same everywhere, thus and as in opposition to later development theories the context, i.e., population and area, where not relevant for the 'unfolding of development'. Modernisation theoreticians saw development as immanent everywhere, and lack of it was explained with reference to the systemic and structural level of a society, which hindered the forces and process of development (Nustad, 2003a: 51). Rostow's version of modernisation theory is evolutionist. It stipulates a universal development model consisting of five phases21 that an underdeveloped society has to pass in order to become developed: Poor countries have to pass through the same phases as the industrialised and developed west did. The poor countries' lack of development is perceived as prehistorical in relation to the developed, which underlines the notion of temporal segregation. According to modernisation theoreticians, external development intervention can help increase the velocity in the processes of development by introducing certain elements that are attributes of a later developmental stage, i.e., elements ascribed to a higher degree of modernity. In the 1950s and 60s, the notion of a modern society referred to certain components such as cities, capital entrepreneurship, democracy, the rule of law, education, and science and technology.22 This notion about modernity shaped the discourse around modernisation theory. Scholarly literature on modernisation theory uses the term 'development' to mean the process of transition or transformation toward a modern, capitalistic industrial economy (Ferguson, 1994: 15). Whereas modernisation theoreticians emphasise the introduction of western elements into an underdeveloped area in order to help promote development, dependency theoreticians reject the utilisation of a western model as a blueprint when trying to develop other areas.
Dependency theory emerged in the 1970s as a result of - and reaction to - the theory of modernisation and as an explanation of unequal structural and economic possibilities between north and south. It also gave an account of why many countries are poor while some are rich. Dependency theory, also signified as underdevelopment theory, draws on Lenin's theory of imperialism and Marxistic analyses of capitalistic societies (Gardner & Lewis, 1996). Dependency theoreticians were one of the first groups to see development in terms of political and historical structures, insisting on the coherence between underdevelopment, exploitation and political structures, describing underdevelopment as a politically active process and not due to a partition in time. Instead of presenting a model for development, dependency theoreticians focused on reasons to why some countries are underdeveloped and others not. The explanation was found in the 'structures of underdevelopment', such as unequal relations between north and south, the impoverishment of the south in terms of e.g. trade, and a hegemonic western control in international institutions. Dependency theory thus challenged the temporal segregation of the modernisation theory when it explained underdevelopment in terms of contemporary political and economic structures. While modernisation theory saw lack of development as a result of poor countries' lack of integration into the capitalistic world marked, dependency theoreticians stated that poor countries in fact were integrated into the world market, which largely was the reason for their underdevelopment and their difficulties of reversing these trends. If the south were to become developed, it needed the same chances and free market opportunities as the north had. The main distinction between modernisation theory and dependency theory is that while the former focuses on internal relations in a country for its lack of development, the latter gives focus to politics and structures imposed on the poor countries. Whereas Rostow sees the fifth stage in modernisation theory's model of development as the objective for all countries, dependency theoreticians see this stage as a critical point where inequalities between poor and rich countries are intensified and reproduced, since the position of rich countries largely relies on the exploitation of the poor ones.
Regarding the structures of power between north and south, dependency theoreticians argue that development is an essentially unequalising process (Gardner & Lewis 1996): While rich nations get richer, the rest inevitably get poorer. This creates a relationship between rich and poor perceived as centres and peripheries (ibid.; Manzo 1991). Structures generated and introduced in the era of colonialisation maintain these structural inequalities. They are sustained by the international system and economy that also are based on unequal structures from the colonialisation era, creating an even more stratified and divided world. In opposition to modernisation theory, dependency theoreticians argue that rich and poor countries are interconnected, and in order for the poor to become developed this relation has to become restructured. The differences between north and south are explained in terms of the south's structural lack of possibilities in relation to the north. Dependency theoreticians state that a dismissal of these structures would enable poor countries to pursue their potential regarding processes of development (Gardner & Lewis, 1996).
'Developmentalism'23 (Manzo, 1991) emerged as a result of the Truman doctrine, and in the 1970s its counter reaction came with the dependency theory, mainly fronted by André Gunder Frank (1967), Samir Amin (1976) and Wallerstein (1974). Both modernisation and dependency theory have been enormously influential in the way development is perceived and practiced. Whereas dependency theory mostly influenced theoretical understandings and obtained resonance within academic sectors, developmentalism influenced development practice and was largely echoed among development policy-makers and implementers (Eriksen, 1989). In 1991, Manzo argued that the field of Third World studies "…once again [was] in a state of crisis" (1991: 30), since both developmentalism and dependency theory largely had been falsified due to their lack of results and positive output, as an addition to the general academic critique of the two development paradigms. Manzo suggested that both theoretical schools, especially the 'dependentistas',24 should consider the critique in order to develop the theories further. Developers and theoreticians have acknowledged the shortcomings of the grand theories but only to a small extent managed to provide the theories with new paradigmatic input. This is echoed in development practice.
In his critique of the dependency theory and the explanation as to why the dependency theory did not entail a paradigmatic shift in development practice, Hobart (1993) argues that the dependistas never managed to free their rhetoric and world-view from the modernisation theoreticians. With focus on knowledge, Hobart shows how the dependency theoreticians reproduced the expert knowledge of the modernisation theoreticians, thus contributing to the generation and reproduction of a development discourse and expert knowledge about development (ibid.; Nustad, 2003a: 80-85). As with modernisation theory, dependency theory also generated a schism between the theoretical model and those supposed to benefit from it, since the intended beneficiaries (e.g. the rural farmers) were as alienated by modernisation theory as they were by dependency theory. Both theories represent a top-down approximation from the developers towards the intended target group. Consequently, dependency theoreticians continued to reproduce the schism between expert knowledge and local knowledge.
In the late 1980s, development studies took a turn towards a post-structural and discursive approach to development, labelled as post-development. Post-development theoreticians do not have a mission in generating a new theory or model on how to execute development practically. They seek to understand how contemporary 'development' functions by identifying its genealogy in order to give an account of why so many development projects seem to fail. Post-development is a radical reaction to the problems aligned with development, and focuses on the structures of development, the underlying premises and gives an account of development's unintended side-effects.
There have been many reactions towards development and its failures. Sachs argues that the period after WW2, the age of development, is coming to an end since the "…four founding premises have been outdated by history" (Sachs, 1992a: 1).25 Development stood as the idea that guided emerging nations in the post-war era. The template and guide for development were the US as a 'beacon on the hill', which through Truman's Point Four launched the idea of development with a call to every nation to follow in its footsteps. Today, after over 50 years of development, the lighthouse shows cracks and is starting to crumble. According to Sachs, "[t]he idea of development stands like a ruin in the intellectual landscape" (ibid.). Several other critical voices to the project of development have been raised during the last decades.
Next to the reaction fronted by the dependentistas, 'anti-development', 'beyond development', 'alternative development', 'human development', and 'post-development' stand as various reactions and critiques to the project of development. Anti-development is a rejection inspired by anger with development's 'business-as-usual' and wants to abandon the project of development as it is known today. Beyond development combines this aversion by looking over the fence after other solutions, theories and methods for approaching the issues of development. Alternative development focuses on the lack of popular participation as the reason for flawed development projects, arguing for participation as the crucial means in development. Human development addresses the need to invest in people in preference to infrastructure and the state (Pieterse, 2000). Post-development, the most radical critique which also has gained most attention, focuses on the underlying structures and premises of development and the unintended side effects that are produced. What sets it apart from the other mentioned critical approaches is on the reason for rejecting development: "It is rejected not merely on account of its results but because of its intentions, its world-view and mindset" (ibid.: 175) because it implies cultural westernisation and homogenisation (ibid.). Thus, Sachs argues that "…it is not the failure of development which has to be feared, but its success" (1992a: 3). This radical approach has lately been somewhat modified. The intentions are largely seen as good. Prominence is rather given to the structures and discourses of development and their formative power that embed and shape the processes and practices of development and its agents, and thus development's outcome.
To get to grips with development practice and its mindset, post-development scholars trace the genealogy of development, and give emphasis to its conception in Truman's Point Four, which ideas later were manifested in Rostow's work on modernisation theory. By depicting development's genealogy post-developers illustrate how development constitutes a discourse where social meaning is produced and maintained, while diverging and contesting knowledge largely is ignored and thus has small pragmatic influence. As stated above, dependency theory had small practical influence on the existing and established system of development knowledge. Post-development scholars argue that development agents, institutions and policy-makers have legitimised, constituted and reproduced the development discourse rather than considering the critique. Discursive development practice reproduces existing knowledge. Seeing development as a discourse came because development studies were in a crisis, and some intellectual circles declared the concept of development dead when entering the age of post-modernity. Pieterse argues that "[p]ost-development overlaps with Western critique of modernity and techno-scientific progress" (2000: 176). As post-modernity is a cultural and intellectual rejection of modernity (Gardner & Lewis, 1996), post-development is a rejection of development.26 Scholars who adhere to the post-structural development critique take advantage in analysing development as a discourse. Hence, these scholars are able to identify what development does and how it functions instead of presenting a solution to underdevelopment as their predecessors tried to do. The strength of post-development's discursive approach is that it allows one to distinguish between the moral aspects of development issues and the theoretical apparatus that has monopolised development discussions, solutions and interventions (Nustad, 2000: 223; Nustad, 2003a). This thesis is about the latter, that is, development discourse as one system of knowledge development agents relate to in their work, and how this is articulated locally through a project.
The development apparatus is the instrumental and implementing aspect of development discourse. The development apparatus consists of an institutional and a conceptual apparatus and it thus manifests development discourse conceptually and institutionally. It is articulated through actors who operate within this apparatus (Ferguson, 1994). The development apparatus is an aggregate term that denotes the various ways the development discourse is maintained and articulated, but also signifies an important element that actors relate to in bringing around development. It consists of certain objective ways of talking about development and stipulates how to plan, design and bring out development. The development apparatus is communicated through e.g. documents, reports, applications, policies, organisations, institutions and projects. The first four reflect the conceptual apparatus, while the last three articulate the institutional apparatus. There is interplay between these two parts, and together they comprise "…the apparatus that is to do the developing" (ibid.: 17).
As discourse, the term apparatus originates from Foucault (dispositif). The dispositif is both a 'thoroughly heterogeneous ensemble' of discursive and material elements27 and the system of relations established between these elements (Brigg, 2002: 427). The apparatus emerges from the genealogy of the discourse manifested in and through the combination of meaning, power and materiality. The apparatus is a systematic network of different strategies, practices, mechanisms and procedures that are active in generating knowledge (Schaanning, 1995: 9-10). Within development discourse's genealogy, the development apparatus emerged in order to arrange and promote development. International institutional and discursive development in the post-war period allowed the emergence of a strong apparatus never seen before. This apparatus and discourse give precedence on how to act through a process of normalisation that implies the use and manifestation of power (Brigg, 2002). The apparatus delivers development problems, solutions and means to plan and intervene (cf. Green, 2003). In general, it delivers a top-down approach to development, which is reflected in the way development agents work, because "…the intervening agent has to construct the object it addresses in a way that makes intervention possible" (Nustad, 2001a: 484). The apparatus delivers methods on how to intervene which reflect and adhere to the development discourse.
The development discourse has become manifested as an objective form of knowledge through the regularity of various development institutions' practices. This system of knowledge constructs its field of intervention as a particular object and creates a structure around that object (Ferguson, 1994: xiv) which development interventions rely upon. Instead of approaching development in terms of theory, concepts and methods, a post-structural discursive approach sees development as a "…form of knowledge which, while including or making use of a series of objects, concepts, and methodological choices, are primarily characterized by regularity in dispersion" (Escobar, 1991: 666). This discourse represents the knowledge development agents act upon. In being formed by the discourse, actors' agencies thus reproduce the discourse. Ferguson denotes this process as the reproduction thesis - that "[a] structure always reproduces itself through a process" (1994: 13). By acting upon this established development discourse, development agencies and agents reproduce it. As a result, knowledge and practices are normalised. These practices feed into and thus strengthen the discourse. This makes it even more difficult for challenging knowledge and practice to get resonance.
Too strict a view on the discourse and its formative power has implications on the general view on actors and their agency. Ferguson states, regarding actors' relations with and reproduction of the development discourse, that
"[w]hatever interests may be at work, and whatever they may think they are doing, they can only operate through a complex set of social and cultural structures so deeply embedded and so ill-perceived that the outcome may be only a baroque and unrecognisable transformation of the original intentions" (ibid.: 17).
Ferguson proposes a rather static picture of actors and their agency in relation to the discourse's formative power. Actors are seen merely as representatives, bearers and reproducers of the development discourse. This is the core in the post-developmental explanation of why so many development projects seem to fail, viz. that actors' agency are constructed by the discourse these actors bear and are embedded in. Actors are deeply embedded into the structures and knowledge of what is seen by post-development scholars as a constructivist and hegemonic discourse. This view on actors and their agency is also amongst the main critiques directed towards post-development theory. The post-developers' comprehension of development discourse as a constructivist structure and system of knowledge provides no room for local variations, complexity and agency in development practice. According to post-development scholars, the formative power of development discourse makes the actors involved reproduce the discourse they relate to non-reflexively. Discursive development practise by various discursive bearers necessarily, according to post-developers' and Foucault's notion of discourse, reproduce the discourse through their agency.
Post-development theory has been opposed in several ways. Below an account is given of some of this critique. Additionally, an actor-orientated approach is offered in combination with a post-development theory to meet some of the critique but also to gain the relevance to some of the lessons from post-structural development critique.
Taking post-development theory further
A lot of criticism has been directed against the post-structural critique of development. This includes theoretical criticism on an eclectic use of Foucault, post-development's lack of instrumentality, lack of focus on agency, lack of an empirical foundation, and its lack of an alternative when dismissing development as a project. Post-development theory is fruitful in understanding development's formal order and system of knowledge. In taking some of the critique into account, mainly by giving attention to agency where the development discourse is articulated, post-development theory's approach to development also gains relevance.
Criticism of post-development theory
According to the anti-Foucauldian Ray Kiely, post-development scholars are wrong in their approach to discourse as a system of knowledge that constructs the reality: "Development is, in the Foucauldian sense, a particular discourse which does not reflect but actually construct reality. In doing so, it closes of alternative ways of thinking, and so constitutes a form of power" (1999: 31). Kiely argues that since discourses do not have agency, it is impossible for individuals to be the product of discourses. The value of a discursive approach depends upon whether agency is taken into account or not. If not, development becomes a cultural construction of post-development scholars. Including agency in the analysis also meets another weak point of post-development theory. Agency nuances the view on discourse, which is otherwise almost exclusively constructed from the analysis of donors' ideologies, policies and documents without identifying or having any real empirical foundation where the development discourse is deployed and articulated.
After identifying post-development's serious lack of taking agency into account, Kiely assesses post-development theory's notion of power. The conception of a constructivist discourse and its power is based on the assumption of Foucault's notion of power; that power does not operate over and against individuals, but rather is 'a machine in which everyone is caught', which thus neglects the agency behind discourse (1999: 36). Kiely argues that this renders the idea of power meaningless, since it does not say anything about who distributes and utilises the power or in what ways, as well as it has implications for the progressive and political aspects of power (ibid.). Power is manifested and articulated in interaction, and is not a priori latent in structures. Consequently, actors' agency and the interplay between actors and discourse must be given focus when identifying power relations. Further Kiely attacks post-development theory for being inconsistent in its anti-essentialism, because "[w]hile it champions cultural diversity and the difference as a source of resistance against Western domination, development itself is portrayed 'in terms of a monolithic hegemony'" (ibid.: 38). Irrespective of the dimensions of time and space, development, in the post-structural approach, constitutes the exercise of western power over non-western people. There are two implications related to this: First that post-development operates with only one tool when analysing development as a discourse, meaning that all development is understood and approached according to this discourse. Whereas post-developers criticise development in representing a hegemonic and constructivist discourse, their counterparts condemn the reductionistic view of post-developers on development in presenting the development discourse as a realm in which everything fits. As post-development scholars argue that development is a western construction representing a panoptic monolithic approach, post-developers are guilty for largely the same in merely having a discursive approach to development. Hence, both views close off alternative ways of thinking and seeing the world. Both views criticise the other of having merely one theoretical tool or approach: 'If the only tool you got is a hammer, the whole world appears as a nail' (Abraham Kaplan, in Nustad, 2001b: 78). Secondly, most post-development theoreticians' general notion of the world is that it consists of two entities; the evil developed west and the noble victims of the south, a view that initially gave rise to post-development theory. As a result, post-development scholars operate with the same concepts and world-view as the structures and ideas they tend to criticise, i.e., that the world is split and divided into two separate parts. Ironically, post-development scholars are themselves largely part of the development discourse and reproduce the realm they initially are criticising. Ray Kiely also raises criticism of post-developers in terms of the relation with politics, relativism, and how post-development ambiguously celebrates tradition. Post-development criticises the development apparatus for neglecting ethnographic particularism. Simultaneously, post-developments see individuals as static and subordinate to the discourse's formative power, and that individuals in general lack the capacity to oppose the discourse's power (cf. Kiely, 1999).
Morgan Brigg questions post-development scholars on their use of Foucault, and argues that most post-development scholars seem to use Foucault eclectically. Brigg puts special emphasis on post-developers' use of Foucault's dispositif (apparatus), the way the concept of power is used, while he argues that Escobar's (1995) use of Foucault is limited to 'a particular sort of style and a sprinkling of the name Michel Foucault and quotations from his work' (Brigg, 2002).
Pieterse (2000) questions the ideas of post-development on a wide range of elements. Most important, he dismisses post-development as it is known because it operates on terms of developmentalism, which post-development sets out to criticise, because it "…replicates the rhetoric of developmentalism, rather than penetrating and exposing its polysemic realities". Further, post-development "…echoes the 'myth of development' rather than leaving it behind" (2000: 188). Still, the core weakness according to Pieterse's viewpoint is that post-development does not give any answers on 'how to do development', that post-development is only an "…endorsement of the status quo…" (ibid.: 184). Schuurman (2000) supports Pieterse in post-development being flawed in terms of not offering any alternative programme for development practice.
Nustad's response to the latter argument is that the "…lack of instrumentality is not a weighty argument against the analysis itself" (2001a: 479) because the call for alternatives and post-development's attempts to demonstrate why development interventions do not work must be kept separate. Nustad addresses some of the post-development critique by including "…an examination of how development interventions are transformed in encounters with target populations…" (ibid.: 480) stating indirectly that this points a way forward for development practice.
It is to the post-development context and discourse that this thesis relate. The approach and analysis will draw upon post-developmentalism, but also address some of the shortcomings of post-development theory by including the role of actors and agency. Post-development theory is a useful approach in order to understand how the formal order of the development sector and donor-recipient relationship function. It gives an insightful account of one of the many realms and systems of knowledge development actors relate to. Despite this, I argue that a post-developmental approach do not generate sufficient information to understand and analyse a development project and what is really going on due to its exclusive focus on discourse and structures, while it neglects the multiple realities and various forms of knowledge. A traditional anthropological insight is that "[t]here is no standpoint from which a phenomenon can be grasped in its entirety" (Nustad, 2003b: 127). I complement the discourse perspective with a focus on actors and actors' agency. By including an actor-orientated approach, one meets the most serious critiques against post-development, because attention is on agency, which also gives the analysis an empirical foundation. Utilising two approaches, what Denzin calls theoretical triangulation (Denzin, 1989), give an account of actors' agency and their relation to structures imposed through a donor-recipient relationship. It also acknowledges the local contextual conditions which form an actors realm, what Barth calls cultural stock (Barth, 1993). Hence this calls for an analysis of actors and development agents in relation to different types of knowledge. On the one side, discursive knowledge, and on the other side, local practical knowledge. Discursive knowledge refers to development discourse, while practical knowledge refers to the multitude of knowledge all actors relate to without necessarily knowing it themselves. The latter is implicit, embodied, non-reflexive - a sort of taken-for-granted knowledge. It is not given that it is congruence or symmetry between discursive and practical knowledge. Discursive knowledge represents a type of expert knowledge, which in its deployment intersects with local and practical knowledge. A point is that both experts and locals can have both systems of knowledge, or alternate eclectically between a discursive and a practical understanding of the world.28 This implies that both systems of knowledge exist on the same logical level but are not necessarily identical.29 Norman Long describes the encounter between different systems of knowledge as a process or situation of interface. In combining both a discursive and actor-orientated approach, representing two different systems of knowledge, the term interface must necessarily be applied in order to describe the encounters between different systems of knowledge. "A principal reason why it has been difficult to integrate structural and actor perspectives is that they entail opposing (or at least diverging) theoretical and epistemological assumptions, similar to Kuhn's paradigms that are incompatible until a 'scientific revolution' confirms the paramountcy of one of them" (Long, 1992a: 18). The concept of interface enables a combination of a structural and actor-orientated approach in the analysis, because it takes the encounter between different systems of knowledge, i.e., the situations of interface as articulated via actors, as its primary focus.
Norman Long defines "…a social interface as a critical point of intersection or linkage between different social systems, fields or levels of social order where structural discontinuities, based upon differences of normative value and social interests, are most likely to be found" (1989: 1-2). Interface is a methodological device for studying linkages between structures and processes, and encounters between different systems of knowledge as articulated through actors. Interface helps to bridge the gap between structural and actor-orientated research. Long states that interface is an analytical tool for understanding what happens in the encounter between different knowledge systems. Long calls for a "…thorough-going actor-orientated approach which builds upon theoretical work aimed at reconciling structure and actor perspectives" (Long, 1992c: 4). This is to counter the resurgence of simplistic system thinking, stressing the importance to acknowledge and take the ethnographic particularism into account (ibid.). The fruitfulness of using interface as a methodological and analytical tool in an actor-orientated approach to the encounter between various systems of knowledge is that its "…concepts are grounded in the everyday life experiences and understandings of men and women, be they poor peasants, entrepreneurs, government bureaucrats or researchers" (ibid.: 5.). Actor-orientated research takes the 'multiple realities' and diverse social practices of various actors into account and makes it possible to get to grips with these different and often incommensurable social worlds of different actors (ibid.).
Development discourse's encounter with 'multiple realities' involves a transfer of technology, knowledge, resources and organisational forms from the more developed world or sector of a country to the less developed parts (Long, 1992a: 19). The encounter denotes a process of transformation as the formal order of development "…is transformed through acquiring social meanings that were not set out in the original policy statements" (Long, 1989: 3). Situations of interface articulate factors which cannot be directly linked to the development programme itself, but evolve as a result of the intersection of different fields of knowledge. In dealing with multiple realities, acknowledging potentially conflicting social interests, we must look closely at the issue of whose interpretations or models prevail over those of other actors, and under what conditions. "Knowledge processes are embedded in social processes that imply aspects of power, authority and legitimation…" (Long, 1992a: 27). This discussion brings out certain parallels between power and knowledge processes. Like power, knowledge is not simply something that is possessed and accumulated. Nor can it be precisely measured in terms of some notion of quantity or quality. "It emerges out of processes of social interaction and is essentially a joint product of the encounter and fusion of horizons" (ibid.). Power and knowledge must therefore be understood relationally and not treated as if it could be codified, depleted or used up. That someone has power or knowledge does not necessarily imply that others are without, nor is this the case in the development sector concerning the relations between donor and recipient. Recipients are not incapable and powerless in their encounter with externally imposed structures, rather they apply a wide range of strategies to cope with the formal order of discursive development. One cannot generalise over the multitude of local and practical knowledge. Neither is it correct to generalise about what happens in the encounter between different systems of knowledge. Whereas the development discourse reflects a formal order of development, what happens in the encounter with other systems of knowledge as it is deployed in various settings is solely an empirical question. This thesis is about the processes involved in the donor-recipient relationship, i.e. the encounter between the development discourse and local practical knowledge, of the Integrated Pastoral Development Programme (IPDP) Afar, Ethiopia.
The era of development has generated what post-development scholars call a development discourse due to the regularity and increasing normalisation of development practice despite the rhetorical alterations. Post-development scholars argue that bearers of the development discourse have a monopoly in presenting premises to development work and policy, and thus development problems and solutions have become standardised. Nevertheless, this view on development and the portrayal of the development discourse's evolution have severe shortcomings in that it does not take agency into account and it lacks an empirical foundation from where development is deployed and where the development discourse intersects with local knowledge through various development agents. The depiction of development discourse is mainly done through scrutinising development, as seen from and by the donor and not from the recipient organisations or the supposed target group of a development project.
Development discourse, as a system of knowledge, is useful in order to get an understanding of the structures and relations within the development sector, and the general system of development knowledge as seen from the donors' side. It thus often is one of several systems of knowledge in situations of interface between donor and recipient within the development sector. Local practical knowledge, which is identified by an actor-orientated approach, is the other encountering part in such situations of interface.
The next chapter shows that it is plausible to operate with the concepts of development discourse and apparatus with regard to the Integrated Pastoral Development Programme (IPDP) and the network of organisations and actors aligned to it. As that chapter shows, development intervention relies upon simplifications and representations of the field in order to generate quantifiable and legible units to plan and intervene on. The next chapter shows how the development apparatus aligned with the IPDP has constructed and articulated the project and simplistically codified the target area and population. Chapter four, on the other hand, illustrates various counter-tendencies that arise from the situation of interface between different systems of knowledge.
In order to intervene in a society, development agents need legible and tangible units of what is to be developed. The development apparatus constructs the project area as a particular kind of object of knowledge (Ferguson, 1994), which is based upon simplifications and representations of the multiple realities manifested in the area. Thus, what is perceived as complex and difficult to grasp becomes uncomplicated, legible and tangible. The construction of the field as an object of knowledge is based on an expert discursive knowledge of development and is articulated through representations. Representations serve to portray or show reality, but the representations are in nature simplistic towards what they seek to characterise or denote. For the discourse bearers the representations are the reality, while for the discourse analyst representations are the main intake to get to grip with the discourse itself.
The purpos