ANTH 320/DEVS 321 PEOPLE AND DEVELOPMENT Fall 2018
I acknowledge that St FX is in Mi’kma’ki, the ancestral and unceded territory of the Mi’kmaq People.
Sept. 26-Oct. 3 (Note Global Issues Forum on Oct. 1) Sustainable development goals.
READ: Kimanthi, H., and P. Hebinck (2018). ‘Castle in the sky’:
The anomaly of the millennium villages project fixing food and markets
in Sauri, western Kenya. Journal of Rural Studies, 57, 157-170.
- What kind of article is this? What is their purpose?
- Why have I asked you to read it?
- to prepare for the Global Issues Forum on October 1 (remember
to go to Dennis/Marie Desmond Halls in Coady West at 3:45, and to read
and prepare for the assignment on it)
- since this article is on a case study of implementation of the
Millennium Development Goals (MDGs), not on the Sustainable Development
Goals (SDGs), how does it help?
- since the SDGs have only been in place for a few years, there
has been little time to evaluate their effect; what can learn about how
the MDGs were implemented that can permit us to think about whether the
SDGs will have better/worse/similar outcomes?
- video pro-SDG; also read the article in the New Internationalist that criticizes the SDGs
- What do Kimanthi and Hebinck argue?
- Theoretical concepts:
What is meant by “assemblage”? (section 4, which both defines the
term, and explains how it is applicable in this case study)
- six practices related to assemblages (from
Li; observe how the authors use them to organize and analyze the
evidence)
-a) forging alignments
- b) rendering technical
- c) authorizing knowledge
- d) managing failures
- e) anti-politics
- f) reassembling
- other concepts/terms (largely from section 2, which I see as a
context section in terms of how the MDGs/MVP fits into the history of
development interventions):
- Green Revolution
- Integrated Rural Development
- Structural Adjustment Policies
- philanthrocapitalism
- Rostovian (based on WW Rostow’s “Stages of Growth”
- rendering technical
- depoliticizing
- how does the MVP define “poverty”?
- What is their methodology?
- multiple sources of information, both past research and current
qualitative research; note the different roles/histories of the two
authors
- note that they point out that they were not allowed access to MVP data
- Context: What is the MVP (Millennium Village Project), in particular, the SMV (Sauri Millennium Village project)?
- Evidence:
- a) how did Sauri get chosen as a result of pre-existing
relationships, therefore relating to the “forging alliances/networks”
idea? Was it the “best” location for a project of this sort?
-b) how did the SMV”render technical” a solution?
- what kinds of things were promoted, and how
did this relate to the underlying philosophy of the intervention about
“modernity” versus “traditional” ways?
-c) what
“knowledge” (understandings of local patterns, ideas about what should
be done to “fix” “problems”, ways of evaluating impact, etc) did
the SMV project claim was “authoritative”
-d) how did the SMV manage failure?
-e) how did the SMV ignore the politics of the region, presenting
its work as “anti-political”? What was really going on in terms of the
political effects of the project?
- f) how was the SMV “reassembled”, especially by local farmers?
- How do you respond to and evaluate this article? Possible questions:
- are the authors being fair to the project and its intentions?
How do they envisage development ought to be done?
- do you think their interpretation is right?
- with respect to whether this is a model for understanding the
SDGs: what key differences in how the MDGs and SDGs were put together
and how they will be implemented might lead to differences in impact?
- what things are similar?
- etc.