Habtamu Girma Demiessie (editorial@ruh-media.com)

Editor`s Note: This viewpoint piece is an extract from an article authored by Habtamu Girma, titled ‘A Better Way to Development Theory and Practice’ which was Presented at the Research Conference Organized by the World Economic Association (WEA), 2018, London. Proceeding of the Conference can be accessed following this link :

• https://www.worldeconomicsassociation.org/files/2018/04/Issue8-2.pdf

The ultimate objective of academia and policy regimes lies in promoting the wellbeing of people. Hence, devising theoretical and practical tools meant to scale up the well-being of people and communities takes the core of academic and policy endeavors. Looking particular context of developing world, however, the teachings and practices on issues of well-being  is blurred, if not too abstract.  

As emerging emperical evidences from development literature suggest, old way of looking the theory and practice meant to address the welfare of communities doesn’t appeal to particular contexts prevailing in developing world. As a result of that, it is not unusual to witness development policies to have remained impotent. As a postgraduate student of economics, I remember what our professor told us from his rich experience in development teachings and practices.in Ethiopia and other countries in Africa. Worth recounting, in this regard, was why communities often are nostalgaic about past.  It is becoming customary in development discourses that post intervention studies carried out often end up unexpectedly, where subjects  far less content with and even plea for the pre-intervention days. This is despite communities’ material needs are better served as a result of interventions aimed at community development. More often than not, development theorists and practitioners are unable to explain those instances, which they ascribe it to a paradox, as nostalgia effect

In my view, if one thoroughly look into the issue,  there is nothing a paradox with nostalgia effect, and it could be explained. The pillar of my assertion goes to the conventional teachings and practices on development, which I alleged for corrupt understanding on the concept of well-being. The dominant narratives in development literature takes for granted development synonymous with material fulfillment. By far, the role and importance of non-material aspects of life are  considered a residual.

 So whom to blame then?

As to my understandings, the very reason why developing countries are underdeveloped is because of corrupt education and policy regimes. With today`s teachings are tomorrow`s policies, where there is a fault in the education system, there would be mess in the policy regimes and overall governance system too. One can fetch from  development literature on the link between the education system and underdevelopment. Dependency theory, one of the post-colonial development theories, has controversial but an important narrative as to why developing countries are underdeveloped. Dependency theory begins by segmenting the whole world as developed and underdeveloped, not only for economic or structural reasons, but also on  the nature  characterizing their relationships. False paradigm hypothesis, a subsidiary of dependency theory, explain the sort of interactions between developed and developing world  typified as unfair,  even not less of deceptive. Its narratives goes where developed world has been injecting misleading the curriculum and policy regimes to weaken countries on the ‘periphery’ of development horizon. Some hardliner intellectuals even dub such a relationship between the two polar worlds as post-modern colonization. Their lines of argument is that the education system is the major tool of post-modern colonization.The assertions of structural economists goes that  the intellectuals and policy practitioners of developing world are the products of those corrupt education systems, and hence it is far-fetched that they would come up with theoretical and policy tools which remedies developmental challenges of their people.

In my opinion, one shall not overlook the views of dependency theory.  Indeed, a number of empirical evidences attest that education system and policy regime of developing countries, including Ethiopia is incompatible to institutional, structural and socio-cultural and value systems specific to their people and communities in general. According to those studies, the bedrocks of underdevelopment in developing countries is ‘one size fits all’ principle molding the academic and policy regimes. Some manifestations of this problems are: overlooking the importance of indigenous knowledge to promote the well-being of people; considering all the western ideals and thoughts are righteous (went up to the extent of cult). On the other hand, local wisdoms were taken as irrelevant or not modern.

In many instances, challenging those corrupt educational systems and policy regimes have been punished. Intellectuals who defies the western thoughts and emphasized the need to look inward encounter setbacks, where their works often portrayed as sub-standard and irrelevant. Their works would also hidden lest disseminated and enlighten the victims. Therefore, where such is a governing reality in the academia and policy regimes , expecting the academicians, researchers, policy makers and/or implementing bodies to remedy the complex developmental challenges of their people and communities is like expecting honey from a fly, as one Amharic proverb goes.

What is expected of the academia and policy circles then?

My suggestion lies in the need to challenge the conventional development theory and practices, which makes its principle one size fit principle, from philosophical, theoretical, methodical and policy perspectives. Hence, it is expected to pinpointing alternative wayouts of underdevelopment and promoting wellbeing of people and communities in developing world in general. More specifically, it takes to confront against one of the reflections of the dysfunctional education and policy regimes prevailing in underdeveloped world, which is ‘disregard to the role and/or importance of socio-cultural institutions of communities in defining the fabrics of all aspects of governance and public life. To that end, key areas of emphasis ought to be  exploring the linkage between behaviors (motivation) of people on one hand, and the overall environment on the other hand. It also takes to model the behavioral and institutional elements specific to developing world, focusing on the unique conditions of particular communities. Academic endeavors are also expected to draw inferences on the behavioral (motivational) and institutional or structural elements in line with possible implications to the well-being of people and communities of interest.

All in all, academic and policy circles are expected to depart from the conventional paradigm. As such, development theories has to make their constructions on an interdisciplinary approach. Therefore, diverse fields of social science and methodological approaches has to be sought in synthesizing, explaining and making inferences on the wellbeing concept. Development policy should also be redesigned in a fashion to being an in-ward looking. This is to mean, rather than adhering a top-down approach, policy regimes should be designed and formulated on the local realities and contexts. While setting accounts on development practices a host of variables needs to be consulted. As such, formulating policies and strategies aimed at promoting the welfare of communities should take into account factors in the realm of economics, sociology, anthropology, psychology, past system of governance, history, geo-politics & geography, among others. Such is how the academic and policy regimes revisited to better serve the expectations of helping achieve  collective wellbeing.

About the Author:

Habtamu Girma is founder and Chief Executive Officer (CEO) at Ruh Media, a digital media startup focusing on addressing wider topics related to development challenges of the African Continent with the Ethiopian context widely covered. He is also a research fellow at the African Economic Research Consortium (AERC), based in Kenya, Nairobi. Mr. Habtamu is currently working on his PhD in the broader fields of Development and Environment Economics, specializing in Energy Economics at the Department of economics, University of Ibadan (UI), Ibadan, Nigeria. He can be reached at editorial@ruh-media.com