COURSE OUTLINE AND READING LIST - POLI 231: THEORIES OF DEVELOPMENT AND UNDERDEVELOPMENT

POLI 231: Theories of Development and Underdevelopment

Course Outline

Course Description:

The course covers theoretical and comparative perspectives in social and cultural bases and origins of the idea of development in human societies. It includes structuralists’s perspectives; liberals/neo-liberal perspectives; institutional pluralist perspectives; evolutionist and dialectical perspectives; and sociological theories concerning social and cultural change; growth and development, etc. it reviews change in development thinking and practice from the 1940s and 1950s to the present.

Objectives:

By the end of the course students should be able to explain the concept of development; to identify the key theories underpinning development and underdevelopment discourse; and to explain the processes of social and cultural change.

Topics

The main topics covered in the course include the following:

·         Lecture One: Defining Development: the topic discusses the philosophical origins of development, broadly understood by scholars and leaders as the improvement of humankind, to be pursued by political leaders through deliberate government policy, underpinned by social engineering approaches.

·         Lecture Two: Overview of Liberal, Structuralists and Institutional perspectives of Development.

·         Lecture Three: Evolutionary Theories: The topic discusses Evolutionary theory that emerged in the early 19^th century, led by Charles Darwin, to explain social changes that occurred after the industrial Revolution and the French Revolution.

·      Lecture Four: Functionalists theories, led by Talcott Parsons (1951), and the introduction of concepts such as ‘system, functional imperative, homeostatic equilibrium and pattern variables,’ into attempts to explain how societies change. The relationship between these theories and development thinking are further examined.

·      Lecture Five: Industrialization and Development. It examines the relationships between development thinking and the Industrial Revolution in Western Europe in the nineteenth (Emile Durkheim and max Weber)

·      Lecture Six: Modernization theories 1950s and 1960s): The topic discusses modernization theories largely spearheaded by Parsons, McClelland, Rostow and Lerner in the 1950s and 1960s, who were mainly from sociological and psychological disciplines. It further discusses why these theories advocated for changes in values, after which they believe development would follow, modeled on the new values. The impact of these theories of development thinking is further discussed.

·      Lecture Seven: Dependency theories (1970s): The topic discusses the emergence of radical (Marxist) theories of underdevelopment which argued that the underdevelopment of the Third world was a result of structural inequalities. The major proponents of these theories include Andre Gunder Frank (1967, 1969), Dos Santos (1973) and Amin (1976). Other issues treated incudes unequal power relations between nations on the world stage and a skewed world economic system that puts developing nations at disadvantage; the oil crisis of the 1970s.

·      Lecture Eight: The World Systems Theories (Centre-Periphery), led by Immanuel Wallenstein (1978, 1979c, 1982) which focused on explaining the development situation of East Asia, especially Japan, Taiwan, south Korea and Hong Kong, that could not be adequately accounted for by Modernization and Dependency Theories, are also discussed.

Teaching and Assessment arrangements:

The course will be taught mainly through lectures, discussions and readings that students will be expected to do. 13 Lecture sessions are planned to cover the various topics in this course. Lectures are compulsory and attendance will be checked against the official register. Students who attend less than 75 percent of the lectures will be removed from the course.

Assessment will follow the standards set by the University of Education, Winneba and the Department of Political Science Education. This will include continuous assessments and a final examination. Failure to complete the continuous assessments automatically disqualifies any students from writing the final examination. The continuous assessment carries 40 marks and final exam carries 60 marks. However, the overall pass mark is 50 out of 100 marks.

Reading List

Edkins, J. and Zehfuss, M. (2010) Global Politics: A new Introduction, London, Routledge                       Giddens, A. (2009) Sociology, Cambridge, Polity Press

McMichael, P (2004) Development and Social Change: A Global Perspective, London, Pine                      Forge Press.

Pike, A., Rodriguez-Pose, A., and Tomany, J. (2006) Local and Regional Development, London,             Routledge.

Ritzer, G. and Atalay, Z. (2010) Reading in Globalization: Key Concepts and Major Debates,       Wiley-Blackwell

Sen, Amartya (2010) Development as Freedom, oxford University Press.

So, Alvin Y. (2010) Social Change and Development: Modernization, Dependency and World                  Systems Theories, Newbury Park, Sage Publications

Webster, Andrew (1990) Introduction to the Sociology of Development, 2^nd edn, Macmillan

Taught by:

Dr. Gabriel Botchwey

Email:gkabotchwey@uew.edu.gh