Agency & Development - Do Individuals Matter?

Concluding Thoughts - Can Practitioners Have Agency?

Is there space for individual agency within the confines of developmentalism? Only if we actively dismantle the two pillars of this ideology - neliberalism and institutionalisation - and confront the power of technocratic elites and INGOs... This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit planetworka.substack.com [https://planetworka.substack.com?utm_medium=podcast&utm_campaign=CTA_1]

Do practitioners have individual agency?

Considering what we have covered in this podcast series, do Plan CDFs exert agency as individual actors? As this episode argues, they cannot, as this is a misreading of 'agency' as an expression of individual action or attributes that is central to developmentalist discourse. This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit planetworka.substack.com [https://planetworka.substack.com?utm_medium=podcast&utm_campaign=CTA_1]

Performatist Tropes - Project Media

Publicising development in the form of projects fulfils important needs of developmentalism. On the one hand it serves northern donors with expressions of the success of development subjects, while simultaneously re-legitimising the INGO as an enabling actor in this success. To do so, project media visits have to set up highly performative scenarios where the primary emergent interests are not necessarily those the project beneficiaries. This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit planetworka.substack.com [https://planetworka.substack.com?utm_medium=podcast&utm_campaign=CTA_1]

Performatist Tropes - The Project Visit

NGO, donor and local government project visits are ceremonious and ritualised, imbuing the event with important political symbolism essential to the legitimacy of actors and their relative status. For the development actors, these events maintain developmental continuity in their areas of operation. This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit planetworka.substack.com [https://planetworka.substack.com?utm_medium=podcast&utm_campaign=CTA_1]

Performatist Tropes - The Sponsor Visit

Child sponsorship is essentially a virtual experience, played out through communication and marketing intermediaries. These programs do, however, offer the opportunity for a sponsor to visit 'their' sponsored child. The sponsor visit becomes a microcosm of neo-colonial arrangements and interactions. The compliance of the sponsored child's family is essential to this enterpise, regardless of benefit to them or their child. This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit planetworka.substack.com [https://planetworka.substack.com?utm_medium=podcast&utm_campaign=CTA_1]