The Rise and Fall of Development Theory - Softcover

Leys, Colin

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0852553501 ISBN 13: 9780852553503

Publisher: James Currey, 1996

Synopsis

This work comments on three decades of development theory, discusses the determinants of the course of its evolution and decline, and exemplifies it from the viewpoint of a leading participant in the debate. Leys suggests that Africa has some lessons to teach about the meaning of uncontrolled capitalist development on a global scale.

North America: Indiana U Press

About this title

Review

...Colin Leys has provided an eminently readable, well argued and concise survey of western development theory, which provides much of interest for the initiated and novice alike ... an excellent student text... - David Simon in THE TIMES HIGHER EDUCATION SUPPLEMENT
... a welcome and concise summing up...both a retrospective view of development theory and a prospective view of African development - Lloyd M. Sachikonye in THE ZIMBABWEAN REVIEW
... there is a great deal to be learned from this book by readers of any theoretical persuasion. Any intelligent and open-minded reader is likely to find his critique of rational choice theory, for instance, devastatingly incisive even if remaining sceptical of his claim that Marxism is especially well suited to remedy its deficiencies. - Richard Jeffries in THE JOURNAL OF DEVELOPMENT STUDIES

From the Back Cover

This book is a 'stock-taking' of development theory at the end of the twentieth century. It argues that the assumptions on which development theory has rested since the 1950s no longer hold. The ex-colonial 'third world' for which development theory was originally developed has fractured into increasingly diverse regions, while the end of the post-war regime of regulated international trade and capital movements has drastically curtailed the scope for state economic intervention. A much broader-based, more historical and more explicitly political theoretical effort is now called for.

Edition details

• Publisher: James Currey
• Publication date: 1996
• ISBN 10: 0852553501
• ISBN 13: 9780852553503
• Binding: Paperback
• Language: English
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 224