The decolonial turn in development in Africa

Busani Mpofu and Sabelo J. Ndlovu-Gatsheni

Chapter 37 in Handbook of African Economic Development, 2024, pp 557-573 from Edward Elgar Publishing

Abstract: This chapter explores the notion of the decolonial turn in development. It deploys the concept of decoloniality to the field of development thinking and practices. It emphasizes that decoloniality is not anti-development but opposes the Western model of development that is regarded as universal while imbued with the evolutionist, unilinear and Euro-centric conceptions of development. We note that what is emerging poignantly is that not all turns in development are decolonial. There has always been internal critiques of modernity and Eurocentrism that are critical but not decolonial. These have failed to resolve present structural and agential sources of social injustices, and asymmetrical power structures, among other practices. Deploying the decolonial epistemic perspective helps us to understand the underlying structural factors sustaining the global system of relationships generating negative development outcomes in Africa and can contribute to its future which should be pluriversal, open-ended, and nonlinear.

Keywords: Development Studies; Economics and Finance; Geography (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2024
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