240088 KU GM3 - Entwicklungstheorien und -paradigmen aus transdisziplinärer Perspektive (2022S)

This course focuses on core developmental theories and paradigms, ideologies, critiques and (global) institutions that have influenced development thinking and practice since the 20th century. In doing so, students critically examine theoretical approaches and concepts, including modernization theory, political economic approaches, world systems analysis, neoliberalism, Eurocentrism, feminist perspectives, post-development, postcolonial/decolonial and other alternative approaches from the global South. We will assess how these paradigms and ideologies have shaped international development policies and the incorporation of the global South into the world economy, including the politics of growth and aid.
The seminar aims to provide students with skills and knowledge to critically reflect on the meanings and goals of paradigms and theories of development. In thematic working groups, students will use these skills to independently explore current topics within international development, such as the climate and food crises, poverty and social inequality, resource boom and extractivism, migration and the precarisation of labour.

Course Aims:
• to develop a historical, transdisciplinary understanding of development thinking
• to review the role of political economy, postcolonialism and feminism as cornerstone disciplines of development studies
• to gain an overview of different paradigms, theories and concepts of international development
• to get to know key thinkers and critics of development theory and thinking
• to contextualise theoretical concepts and approaches within thematical case studies