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DSA Annual Conference November 2008DEVELOPMENT’S
INVISIBLE HANDS
Saturday
8th November 2008 RESEARCH
STUDENT BURSARIES: DEADLINE FOR SUBMISSION OF ABSTRACTS - 30th JUNE
2008 REGISTRATION NOW OPEN - Please visit the Registration and Fees page Call for Papers Cities in an Insecure World Panel Some of the most intractable and
enduring challenges of development are concerned with reducing
insecurity. Early and very current development debates have been
concerned with issues of food security. Ensuring sustainable
economic development and livelihoods in the context of volatile global
markets is another enduring preoccupation of development, as are efforts
to guarantee social security or protection. Concern about the
relationship between national and human security has been at the centre
of recent development debates. All these aspects of security have
particular implications for and manifestations in cities. Urban
economies and livelihoods are inextricably tied into or bypassed by
global economic forces. The food riots sparking off in cities around the
world are testimony to the fact that urban food security is a critical
issue for developing countries. And increasingly modern warfare is
impacting on cities directly through contemporary combat or indirectly
through displacement of people from conflict zones in the countryside. These
insecurities now accompany more familiar dimensions of urban
vulnerability such as irregular or inadequate access to urban services
such as water and sanitation and poor environmental conditions,
resulting in health insecurities; vulnerability to violence and fear of
violence as cities become increasingly subject to violent crime and rule
by gangs and mafias; and other forms of physical insecurity related to
natural and man made disasters, including climate change and extreme
weather conditions to which cities and their vast populations are
particularly vulnerable, especially in the absence of strong and
effective urban governance. The aim of
this panel is to discuss the relationship between cities and development
in an insecure world. Theoretical, empirical and policy papers are
equally invited. A major conceptual issue to be addressed is whether
global, national and city level insecurities might influence the way in
which cities are conceptualised and addressed in development research
and policy to date. For example, does the urban bias thesis still have
resonance and what does over urbanisation mean in a world where the vast
majority of urban workers do not enjoy formal conditions of labour? Empirical and
policy questions might include the following. Do cities need to be
factored into economic analysis as spatial entities? What are the
implications of the security-development nexus for cities? What do we
know about cities and climate change and what should we know? What are
the challenges of an insecure world for urban health and urban
environments? Are city governments up to the task of addressing multiple
and intersecting insecurities and have decentralisation policies helped
or hindered them in this? Are citizenship rights and an inclusive urban
politics possible in insecure cities in an insecure world? Abstracts
of 750-1000 words should be submitted to the convenors with a copy to
Frances Hill (conference@devstud.org.uk).
The deadline for submitting an abstract is 15th
July 2008. Background to the ConferenceThe year 2008 is the DSA’s 30th Anniversary and the Annual Conference will celebrate this. Huge changes have occurred during the past thirty years which have redefined development agendas and we must expect changes of similar magnitude over the next thirty years. The themes of the conference will reflect the forces likely to influence future global change and re-shape development agendas once again. The DSA was formed in 1978 to “advance knowledge
of alternative processes and methods of socio-economic change”. Since
then the main focus of development studies has shifted, from debates
between grand theories of global transformation linked to the
ideological and political conflict of the Cold War, through the ‘end
of history’ to a narrower concentration on means of achieving poverty
alleviation, the Millennium Development Goals, and so on. Arguably,
debate has become limited to a discussion of different degrees and modes
of interventionism within a general acceptance of the dominance of
liberal democracy and globalised industrial capitalism. In the meantime, however, many other dimensions and
drivers of global social change have gained in importance. Religion,
security, and global climate change may be the most obvious. But just as
the forces which led to the end of the Cold War may have been
‘invisible’ to those debating development theories in 1978, so we
may expect that the forces which will prove to have shaped the world of
2038 are largely invisible to us. And indeed, even the more obvious new
forces are still not ‘seen’ well enough by those debating
development. ProcessThe day will consist of three plenaries and two breakout sessions of
75 minutes (with eight parallel
panels in each). Thandika Mkandawire, Director of UNRISD, and Gautam
Mody at The New Trades Union Initiative are confirmed guest speakers for
the first plenary. We are in the process of pulling together another
plenary session on “Alternative Ways of Financing Development –
looking beyond the aid agenda”. In the third plenary, on “Guns, Gods
and Greenhouse Gases”, we will be asking a number of DSA’s
past presidents to bring their own ‘magic spectacles’ and tell us
how they see these and other forces shaping our futures. To establish themes for
the breakout sessions, we issued
a ‘Call for Panels’, where we asked questions such as: What are the
influences which will shape the next 30 years of development and
development studies? What are the big issues going to be in the next
three decades? What comes after the MDGs? What is the reasoning behind
your ideas? Who are the thinkers. movers and shakers who are beginning
to see where things are going? What should we, as the development
studies community in the UK, be doing to work with these less obvious
actors? We reviewed
almost 30 responses, with some exciting ideas on these ‘invisible
hands’ moulding development, and chose 16 panels for the parallel
breakout sessions. Formats will vary. Some will involve 3 paper
presentations plus discussion. In other cases, up to 5 papers will be
posted on the conference website well in advance and presented very
briefly (in 5-10 minutes) at the conference itself, with critical
comments from discussants followed by open discussion. Post conference publicationPost conference publication could take several
forms. Individual papers will be eligible for publication in Special
Editions of the Journal of International Development and European
Journal of Development Research. In some cases, a panel convenor and
contributors may wish to write a joint thematic review paper following
the conference, for consideration in one of these Special Issues. In
addition, certain panel topics may be suitable for a group of papers to
be published as a ‘Policy Arena’ in these or other journals. The
organising committee will arrange a post-conference editorial system
prior to any publication. PanelsOf the 16 panels, the first twelve are open to proposals for papers. Further details, together with contact details for their convenor(s), are on the conference website at http://www.devstud.org.uk/conference-08/abstracts.htm or click on the links below. Their themes are:
The other four selected panels are organised around particular large-scale research projects, partnerships or consortia. They are not open to paper proposals from outside. Their themes are:
Call for PapersThe first twelve panels will include papers chosen
on the basis of competitive refereeing of long abstracts. We want the
papers to be original, creative, provocative, and where possible
evidence-based. We are particularly keen on participation by scholars
and experts from outside development studies with important messages for
us. You are invited to propose a paper for one of these
first twelve panels. Please refer to the detailed panel descriptions on
the website to ensure your proposal is appropriate. You are then asked
to submit the following to the relevant panel convenor, with a copy to
Frances Hill at the address below, by 20th June 2008 (note
revised date):
A process for the anonymous review of abstracts
will be established between the panel convenor(s) and the conference
organisers. Decisions by the panel convenor(s) and/or the organising
committee on the basis of expert reviewers’ reports will be subject to
the usual ‘editorial conditions’. Selected papers will be notified by
14th July 2008. Full papers (5000 words) should then be
submitted for posting on the conference website by 15th
September 2008. Summary of Important Dates
Contact
Page last updated: 9th May 2008 |
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