Week 3 : Understanding Development

Question 1

List 3 types of visions of development.

Answer 1

• Economic growth and modernity
• Dependency and destruction
• Human development

Question 2

What is the theory of modernisation?

Answer 2

Evolution towards a modern industrial society, and liberal democracy as capitalist development expands across the world.

Question 3

What are the 5 stages of Rostow’s stages of growth model?

Answer 3

1. Traditional society
2. Pre-take off stage
3. Take off stage
4. Drive to maturity
5. Mass consumption society

Question 4

What is the cycle of growth?

Answer 4

Profits > re-investment >technological innovation > increased productivity > growth

Question 5

What is the dependency theory?

Answer 5

Rich countries in the Global North create and maintain their wealth through exploitation of poor countries in the Global South.

Question 6

What did Dudley Seers propose in 1969?

Answer 6

The notion of ‘human-centred development’.

Question 7

What does human-centred development mean?

Answer 7

The idea that development should not just be about things (GDP), it should be about people.

Question 8

List the focuses of human-centred development.

Answer 8

• material wealth, equality, democracy, literacy, women’s empowerment, sustainability, human security

Question 9

List the 3 main measurements of the Human Development Index.

Answer 9

• Life expectancy index (at birth)
• Education index (to measure knowledge through mean years of schooling and etc.)
• GNI index ( to measure a decent standard of living)

Question 10

Give an example of settler colonialism.

Answer 10

Some Europeans in the 15th and 16th centuries settled in ‘newfound’ lands ‘opened up’ for commerce, notably in Australasia and the Americas, displacing indigenous peoples.

Question 11

Give an example of exploitation colonialism.

Answer 11

Other Europeans set up trading posts through diplomacy or force, notably in South and East Asia, to exploit resources and local labour to benefit the metropole.

Question 12

Why do oil prices rise in 1973?

Answer 12

As a result of the Yom Kippur war, with profits placed in Western private banks, who lent the money to poorer developing countries.

Question 13

How did the economic crises in rich countries affect developing countries?

Answer 13

Triggered a debt crisis in developing countries who struggled to sell their exports and increased borrowing substantially.

Question 14

What were the 3 steps of the structural adjustment for economic reform?

Answer 14

• Stabilise the macro-economy
  -Get the prices right
• Eliminate barriers to trade

Question 15

What were the approaches of stabilising the macro-economy?

Answer 15

• Raising interest rates to curb inflation
• Cutting public expenditure to reduce government deficit
• Cutting imports to improve balance of payments
• Focus on repaying debts

Question 16

What were the approaches of ‘getting the prices right’?

Answer 16

• To devalue currency to encourage exports
• To eliminate subsidies that benefit urban consumers and marketing boards that keep prices high for producers

Question 17

What were the approaches of eliminating barriers to trade?

Answer 17

• Getting rid of artificial barriers to trade such as tariffs and quotas
• Building on a country’s comparative advantage in international trade