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ABSTRACT
Development as presented in the MDGs/SDGs is a well-planned step-by-step enterprise. If we dig deeper into the development debate, it is clear that the dilemma of eradicating poverty and achieving sustainable development is still unsolved, despite all efforts. Thus, development seems to be fictional in the sense of an unreachable utopia. Against this background, it is helpful to connect the development debate with utopian studies. We learn from utopian studies that there are not only fictional utopias as a vision of a just world, which may never be realised. There are also lived utopias that unpack alternative approaches to overcoming inequality or meeting ecological challenges, and which can be realised at least within a limited space. This applies to concepts from in the Global South, such as swaraj, buen vivir and ubuntu, or ecovillages and solidarity economies that present themselves as models for alternative development. As lived utopias, they follow future practice in a defined area in which the desired future becomes part of the present. These concepts are new models in the critical development debate. They are particularly successful in communities that share a common vision and common values. At the same time, there are doubts whether these models may be realised at the national or global. With regard to the fictional character of development goals, it is obvious that we still lack a feasible global strategy with a vision for the future that is attractive enough to gain global support and that can really be accomplished.
Disclosure statement
No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).
Notes
1 This is often addressed as ‘modernity’ without considering the on-going debate on different concepts of ‘modernity’. We will not discuss this wide field, and will only highlight the main elements targeted by the critique: capitalism, globalisation and intensified industrialisation. We therefore place the word ‘modernity’ in inverted commas.
2 Interestingly, the mainstream debate on social movements with its focus on North America and Europe mostly overlooks similar critique of social movements in the Global South (to be discussed later).
3 We are well aware that there are different programmes of development with regard to economic growth and increasing consumption possibilities, but with different understandings of freedom and democracy. E.g. the notion of an Islamic state as in Iran, Hindu nationalism in India, or post-socialist authoritarian ideas in China (Hodzi and Åberg, Citation2020; Naughton, Citation2017). We will not discuss these concepts in this paper but focus on the contradiction between the mainstream notion of development and the different utopian concepts.
4 By analysing the utopian moment of development, we are not interested in exploring the reasons for failure of development, but in arguing that the idea of global development harbors failure or the fictional in itself. Some critics underline also the links with the overall political world system and its power structures but this debate goes beyond the scope of this paper.
5 Examples are the British Development and Welfare Acts of 1940 (Hailey, Citation1957, 203, 1323) or Harry S. Truman’s inaugural address that placed development policy on the international agenda (Truman, Citation1949).
6 In the beginning the state has been seen as a core actor of economic development in the Global South either with a kind of state capitalism, with a developmental state (Haggard Citation2015).
7 This unified understanding of ‘modernity’ has been replaced by the notion of varieties of modernities or multiple ‘modernities’ (Eisenstadt, Citation2000; Preyer and Sussmann, Citation2016).
8 Critical social theorists do not abandon hope for a better future or utopia, but they assume that this future cannot be specified (cf. Barboza, Citation2010).
9 For an overview of different understandings of utopia, see Claeys and Sargent (Citation1999) or Levitas (Citation2011). However, there is an academic dispute as to whether the fictional understanding should be expanded to lived utopias.
10 In academic debates, different terms for lived utopias circulate, such as real utopias, everyday utopias or lived utopianism.
11 It is remarkable that the formation of buen vivir as an ‘alternative to development’ was supported by a workshop of GIZ, the German development organisation (Altmann, Citation2013, 102).
12 For further examples see Kothari et al. (Citation2019). However, we should be aware that not all lived utopias represent an idealised notion of grass-roots democracy and gender equality. Extreme examples are the Jihadi governance (for Mali see: Badi and Klute Citation2022). Thus, the diversity of alternatives is not only a strength but also a starting point for debates about fundamental differences between them. For the diversity of self-governance see: Neubert (Citation2021); Neubert et al. (Citation2022).
13 It is organised by a collective of adivasi single women (Eka Nari Sanghathan, ENS).
14 Rojava got known after their successful fight against the Islamic State in 2014 and 2015.
15 The Turkish PKK was founded as communist organisation in 1978 with the aim to liberate towards a Kurdish nationalism. The PYD emerged in 2003 in Syria from PKK cells.
16 Private companies or property are forbidden. In addition, there is a war economy which follows a different logic and seeks to secure peace in the war zone.
17 Some of the cases presented would not see themselves as ‘alternative’ but simply as a local way of organizing life more or less influenced by local traditions.
Additional information
Notes on contributors
Antje Daniel
Antje Daniel is a substitute Professor in the Department of Development Studies at the University of Vienna in Austria. Her research interests are development, utopia, future, civil society and social movements, with a special focus on Latin America, Europe and Africa.
Dieter Neubert
Dieter Neubert is a retired Professor for Development Sociology, University of Bayreuth, Germany. Research interests are sociology of Africa, post-conflict reconstruction, sociology of development policy, risks and disasters, local knowledge, participative methods and globalisation. He has conducted research in Africa (Kenya, Uganda, Rwanda, Mozambique, Ghana), as well as in Vietnam and Thailand.