Politics of Development, part 1
This week commences our two-part discussion of the 'Politics of Development' with a focus on Egypt. We compare and contrast the ways in which economic and cultural accounts of the 21st century economic and political condition of the Middle East diagnose the region's problems. We also do this by factoring how transformations of the 19th and early 20th century played a pivotal role in the Egypt's politics and economics and how these are relevant for assessing contemporary proposals for economic and political reform.
Seminar Questions:
1. Compare and contrast psycho-cultural (Friedman, Lewis) with economic explanations (AHDR, De Soto) of political and economic development.
2. How do the Arab Human Development Report and The Mystery of Capital understand development and explain its failure?
3. What alternative factors and understandings of development do Mitchell and Davis consider that could serve as a critique of De Soto's argument?
4. Why does capitalism or political development appear to have 'failed' in the Middle East? Why do arguments with little evidence gain such currency?
Readings:
[Review from Week 2] Timothy Mitchell, ‘The invention and reinvention of the peasant,’ republished in Chp. 4, Rule of Experts, and also read Chp. 2 'Principles True in Every Country' (University of California Press: 2002). [ebook]
UNDP, The Arab Human Development Report (2002), 'The state of human development in the Arab world' chp 2. For additional background, see 'Overview: A future for all' and chp 1.
Hernando De Soto, The Mystery of Capital (2000): chp. 1 ‘The Five mysteries of capital’ and chp. 3 ‘ The Mystery of Capital,’ available at: https://www.ild.org.pe/publications/books/the-mystery-of-capital.
Bernard Lewis, 'What went wrong,' The Atlantic, January 2002.