The normative and scientific justifications for development theory

This article argues that liberal and structuralist versions of development theory do provide a scientific basis for the management of emancipatory social change by answering its positivistic and cultural relativistic critics. It shows that positivism depends on methodological individualism, that this principle does not hold in societies where market systems and free individuals have yet to be created. It then shows that liberal development theory does provide a scientific basis for creating such institutions, and therefore for the necessary changes in individual behaviour that it must entail. Second, it shows that individualism is an inadequate basis for understanding and managing the complex and hierarchical institutions of late capitalist society, and therefore the need to use the scientific insights provided by modem institutional theory in order to do so. Then, third, it shows that imposing these principles threatens many of the values and understandings that governed societies that have been based on ethnic exclusivism, theocracy, patriarchy or commandism. It shows that development necessarily generates social conflict, but also that local values and understandings cannot simply be repressed because they do provide people with the basis on which they live their lives. It argues that practitioners must respect these traditions where they can, but find ways of adapting their insights to local needs, values and capacities.