Alternative Development

'''Alternative Development '''

definition          “At its twentieth special session in 1998, devoted to the world drug problem, the General Assembly defined alternative development as:

A process to prevent and eliminate the illicit cultivation of plants containing narcotics and psychotropic substances through specifically designed rural development measures in the context of sustained national growth and sustainable development efforts in countries taking action against drugs, recognizing the particular socio-economic characteristics of the target communities and groups, within the framework of a comprehensive and permanent solution to the problem of illicit drugs.

Alternative development means giving farmers an economically viable, legal alternative to growing coca bush, opium poppy or cannabis plant. UNODC works to reduce the cultivation of illicit crops through a variety of development-oriented poverty reduction and rural development strategies, including agricultural-based initiatives, that lie at the heart of much of UNODC's operational activity at the national, regional, subregional and international levels. UNODC implements multisectoral rural development projects in Latin America, South-East Asia and the southern part of Central Asia. Furthermore, UNODC helps countries link their drug control approaches to development policies and strategies.

Currently, UNODC implements alternative development projects in Afghanistan, Bolivia, Colombia, Lao People's Democratic Republic, Myanmar and Peru.”

http://www.unodc.org/unodc/en/alternative-development/index.html



discussion        “Some scholars and activists … imagine a ‘post-development’ era in which community and ‘indigenous’ knowledge become a reservoir of creative alternatives to development… The alternatives-to-development or ‘alternative development’ position entails ‘the abandonment of the whole epistemological and political field of postwar development (Escobar 1991:675)” (Edelman and Haugerud 2005:2)

                             “Alternative development has been concerned with introducing alternative practices and redefining the goals of development. Arguably this has been successful, in the sense that key elements have been adopted in mainstream development. It is now widely accepted that development efforts are more successful when there is participation from the community. NGOs now play key roles on the ground and in development co-operation. This success rejects not simply the strength of NGOs and grassroots politics but also the 1980s' roll-back of the state, the advance of market forces and the breakdown of regulation. All the same, the goals of `development' have been generally redefined. Development is no longer simply viewed as GDP growth, and human development is seen as a more appropriate goal and measure of development. By the same token this means that alternative development has become less distinct from conventional development discourse and practice, since alternatives have been absorbed into mainstream development. In the context of alternative development several pertinent positions and methodologies have been developed, but arguably alternative development has failed to develop a clear perspective on micro-macro relations, an alternative macro approach, and a coherent theoretical position” (Pieterse 1998:344).