Development as Trasformation

But what is development? There are as many answers as there have been times the question had been asked. Joseph Stiglitz proposes a comprehensible answer that forms a conceptual quintet. “Development,” according to Stiglitz (2002:252) “is about transforming societies, improving the lives of the poor, enabling everyone to have a chance at success and access to health care and education.” It is not about helping enrich the handful elite of a country. Neither is it about “creating a handful of pointless protected industries that only benefit the country’s elite” (Stiglitz 2002:252). Eyal Press (2002) observes that development for Stiglitz is “not just the accumulation of capital—it is about a transformation of society, a change in ways of thinking.” In short, to transform a society, the poor must have a chance at success which can happen only if they have the means to stay healthy and receive appropriate education. But only with a leap of the imagination can a way of thinking change such that Stiglitz’s conceptual quintet would find traction. At this juncture, it would seem that the novelist Sionil Jose anticipated Stiglitz the Nobel prize-winning economist. It is in this conjunction where perhaps development and imagination can come into fertile and productive intercourse.

It is without doubt economics has a hand in the outcome of the social and political fortunes of humanity. Any discourse on development and poverty cannot avoid intruding into economic territory. But economics operates with terse mathematical models which by necessity simplify the reality modeled. In short, economic models cannot fully represent mathematically life as lived by real people. Nor can a formula or equation predict with certainty the outcome of human actions whether performed out of hope or despair. There is richness in the social text—the complex web of traditions, customs, norms, history, beliefs, and relationships—whose essence cannot be gathered as symbols of a calculus. “Simplification,” Mankiw (2002:11) contends “is a necessary part of building a useful model.” Yet models, according to Mankiw (2002:11) “assume away features…that are crucial to the issue at hand.” This assuming away of crucial features, he claims “lead to incorrect conclusions.” But this fact remains: whether for ill or good, economic conclusions, prognoses, or forecasts derived from, or reached through the manipulation of abstract models always affect the lives of flesh-and-blood people decisively.


A certain sense of disappointment stains the reputation of the present concept of development and progress that has been described as linear and infinite. It would seem this smudge was dabbed by the soiled brush of this abstract concept’s unfulfilled promise, the promise of material abundance and limitless progress. Then there is also the looming specter of the absent correlation between democracy and economic development. The promise of the utilitarian view of society remains unfulfilled because individual maximizations did not result in a sustainable process of democratization. The liberal view holds that the task of programming the government in the interest of the society at large results from the democratic process. In this view, government is portrayed as public administration apparatus, and society is conceived as a network of interacting private individuals structured by market forces. It also presumes that in the democratic process, compromises between competing interests are formed in the spirit of fairness and equality.

But economic development is “a very delicate topic,” says Mary Douglas (2004:109). “It is as difficult to talk about the causes of poverty without putting blame on the poor.”

Amartya Sen (1999:35) points to “a distinction between two general attitudes to the process of development” discernible in both “professional economic analysis and in public discussions and debates.” Sen (1999:35) describes the first view in which development is seen as a “fierce” process that “demands calculated neglect of various concerns that are seen as ‘soft-headed’.” These soft-headed concerns include "social safety nets that protect the very poor, providing social services for the population at large, departing from rugged institutional guidelines in response to identified hardship, and favoring…political and civil rights
and the 'luxury' of democracy" (Sen 1999:35).

This austere attitude places these soft-headed concerns in storage to be brought out for airing “when the development process has borne enough fruit” because “what is needed here and now is ‘toughness and discipline’” (Sen 1999:35). In contrast to this hard-as-nails attitude is “an alternative outlook that sees development as essentially a ‘friendly’ process…exemplified by…mutually beneficial exchanges…or by the working of social safety nets, or political liberties, or of social development—or some combination or other of these supporting activities” (Sen 1999:35-6). In harmony with Stiglitz’s understanding of development aimed toward uplifting those who live in poverty, Sen espouses the idea of “development as a process of expanding the real freedoms that people enjoy” because the expansion of freedom is no less than “the primary end and the principal means of development” (Sen 1999:36).

Thus, development “is the process of expanding human freedoms, and the assessment of development has to be informed by this consideration.” It can be surmised that Sen’s concept of development as a process of expanding the real freedoms that people enjoy rose over the notion of development as a fierce process on the wings of creative imagination.