Eye to Eye

Breaking through the theory/practice impasse in recent development studies, this book recenters development debate upon culture. Spanning economics, politics, law, education, and literature, the collection foregrounds the double role of culture in the development process. First, it locates development practices within changing cultural contexts; second, it moves beyond the North/South dichotomy by focusing on the lived experience of development. The book's contributors--academics and...
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Breaking through the theory/practice impasse in recent development studies, this book recenters development debate upon culture. Spanning economics, politics, law, education, and literature, the collection foregrounds the double role of culture in the development process. First, it locates development practices within changing cultural contexts; second, it moves beyond the North/South dichotomy by focusing on the lived experience of development. The book's contributors--academics and lawyers, politicians and NGO activists, literary critics and writers - propose innovative accounts of development practices.The book focusses on seven crucial debates within the field of gender and development, presenting multiple perspectives on each issue. Contributors from different disciplines debate issues, such as the political ideology governing international discussions of female genital mutilation/circumcision, the extent to which global capitalism manipulates women's labor, resistance to education and development policies by women at the grass-roots level in many areas of the world. The collection paints a vivid picture of the sites where development occurs today: parliaments, factories, courts, banks, classrooms, roadside stalls, guilds, athletic fields, publishing houses, hospitals, cinemas, novels, and homes. The women described in this book, as well as those writing for it, have exploited the interstices of the cultures they inhabit to articulate new possibilities for sustainable personal and community development.This book brilliantly demonstrates why development policy must respond to cultural difference and illustrates the rewards of doing so. Essential reading for students, academics, and policy makers in development and women's studies, it advances a new development feminism for the 21st century.