Modernization and development :The Search for Alternative Paradigms C.1

Modernization, the dominant theme of the 1950s and 1960s, has now lost its significance while the concept of development has of late been subjected to a searching review and a paradigm shift. But is there any consensus among scholars, policymakers and politicians regarding the goals and strategies for a new kind of development? Professor Dube sets out to answer this question while also outlining the dimensions of the new conception of development which constitutes a radical departure from prevailing approaches to Third World problems.
Taking as his starting point the western origins of the notion of modernization and the failures of development it has led to in practice, the author establishes that an alter native development paradigm can no longer take the narrow goal of economic growth as its primary objective. But, if human needs and the quality of life are the real goals of change, what, then, are the implications of this wider concept of development-for attitudes to the environment for the role of or denary people in determining for themselves their development goals and ways of achieving them; for conscientization and for affirmative action geared to the 'most wretched of the wretched of the earth? These are some of the fundamental questions to which this thought-provoking book addresses it self. Its usefulness lies in its being a succinct guide to the new thinking about development in the Third World.