PROCESS OF DEVELOPMENT
Historically the process of Development can be categorised into stages. These stages occurred gradually over a period of years as humankind began discovering newer ideas, inventions, communication technologies and scientific expertise. The focus often was narrowed down to overcoming Poverty and gaining economic strength and technological advancement. The eighteenth and twentieth centuries saw many thinkers and intellectuals focusing on Poverty and how to address it. Bruce Currie- Alder states that “the contributions of David Hume, Adam Smith, James Stuart and John Stuart Mill mark the origin of debates on economic growth, the distribution of wealth and the principles underlying public action. The work of French thinkers complemented such writing with a focus on promoting equality, freedom and justice. Meanwhile newly independent countries in the Americas aspired to build a different society inspired by such ideals. The underlining concern of such thinking was to imagine and achieve a better society at home.” [1] This was the beginning of what later developed as Westernisation and Modernisation concepts.
We look at these stages that gradually shows how Development occurred all across the world and how Development communication gradually emerged.
The First Stage: Around the 1960s
During these years, research on ‘Communication’ had become a matter of deep interest, especially in countries like America, who initiated many researches in this field. Development was considered as a result of Economic Growth based on Productive resources of a country and Modernisation. Cultural practices were shunned as old fashioned and lacking speed and intellect. This was called a Dominant Paradigm. This Dominant Paradigm encouraged the values of Western Science.
The Dominant Paradigm focused on two main factors:
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1) Productive resources a society had
2) Economic institutions to use and to guide the use of the resources (Weaver and Jameson, 1978)
The main concern in this paradigm was to have high rates of economic growth along with a high rate of state intervention and intense economic planning. This dominant paradigm further escalated in biases against cultural practices and promoted the theory of Westernisation and Modernisation as the only way to development. This dominant paradigm was also used t address the issues in the undeveloped nations, many who were reeling in poverty and lack of amenities. Some had just achieved freedom from slavery and had many issues to deal with. These were also addressed as ‘Third world’ countries by the ‘developed’ nations.
However, this dominant paradigm was severely criticised by many scholars towards the 70’s as they believed that this paradigm with this sort of a development only made the rich richer and the poor even more dependent on the rich. This was the Dependency theory and it lead to the development of the Second stage.
The Second Stage: Around the 1970s
There was severe criticism of the Modernisation and Westernisation models of development that totally discarded indigenous wisdom of nations and initiated a forced model of development. Many of the technologies could not be adapted easily as the poor countries lagged basic amenities.
It was during this period that the new concept of development emerged spear-headed by a man named ‘Paulo Friere’ which had its main crux a participatory model wherein, the people of the place were conscientized and contributed equally to their own development. Paulo Friere used adult literacy campaigns to conscientize poor farmers in the North eastern part of Brazil and empowered the landless peasants to demand for their rights for freedom from oppressive conditions and for a better living. This led to the gradual formation of the Participation Communication Theory.
Jacob Srampikal writes that “according to his more influential model (1970b), development communication can be considered as a tool that the grassroots can use to-
The Third Stage: Around the 1980s
While development was viewed in a positive way through the Emerging Participatory communication paradigm, the 80’s saw to the rise of the concept of Sustainable development. A concept that now took into concern the large harm being done to environment in the name of development and massive consumerism.
“The Brundtland Commission's report defined sustainable development as "development which meets the needs of current generations without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own needs”.[3] This definition highlighted the importance of Nature and its important role in Development. The massive greed for economic growth saw to a large-scale destruction of Nature and many of its finite resources and a pollution of its infinite resources in the name of development. “Economic and social well-being cannot be improved with measures that destroy the environment. Intergenerational solidarity is also crucial: all development has to take into account its impact on the opportunities for future generations.”
The Fourth stage: The Present
The current stage recognises all that had been missing or rather unnoticed previously. The definition of development included all peoples and their environment. With the bludgeoning population, development becomes a daunting task. It has many aspects and concerns stemming from multiple issues of any given country. While Data and technology have proved to be a boon, this era has also become conscientized about the environment.
Scientific Expertise,
developed Economics and Statistics has today enabled humankind to calculate the
development in a country using indicators that mathematically state how well
developed or undeveloped a nation is. These indicators will be discussed in the
third Blog. One thing we need to be aware even today is that facts cannot be erased,
many developing and undeveloped nations continue to languish in debts albeit
the fact that quite a lot of development has occurred.
The above stages are mentioned only to aid students. The process of Development has occurred over a period of years gradually and will continue. It will re-evolve itself taking into consideration the needs that continue to crop up in varied nations amidst people and the environment at large.
[1] Bruce Currie-Alder (2016) The state of development studies: origins, evolution and prospects, Canadian Journal of Development Studies / Revue canadienne d'études du développement, 37:1, 5-26, DOI: 10.1080/02255189.2016.1135788
[2] Jacob Srampickal S.J. (2006), Development and Participatory Communication, Communication and Research trends, Centre for the Study of Communication and Culture, Volume 25 No. 2, Pontificia Università Gregoriana Rome, Italy
