The overarching question for the paper on James Ferguson’s book

The overarching question for the paper on James Ferguson’s book

The overarching question for the paper on James Ferguson’s book is: What is the ‘project of development’ as he describes it, and what is his critique? Choose three of the following comparisons to help you explain the different issues he raises in his attempt to offer us a different way of thinking about Africa beyond the discourse of development.  Please offer details and examples from the book on each of the comparisons below, to demonstrate the depth of your knowledge, and to make your argument (as presented in your thesis!).

1) the question of a free and independent nation-state, through the lens of the different histories of Lesotho and Transkei (chapter 2);

2) the old paradigm of nation-building versus the new paradigm of ‘state and society’ (chapter 4);

3) the de-moralizing and re-moralizing of economies (chapter 3);

4) the Angolan model versus the Zambian model of development (chapter 8)

5) vertical and horizontal (transnational) topographies of power (and resistance) (chapter 4);

6) the paradoxes of sovereignty and independence;

7) stages of development versus de-developmentalized alternative modernities (p.188) and the telos (goal/purpose) of modernity versus de-temporalized nonserialized but ranked political-economic statuses (p.189).

Finally, combining his various critiques of the ways we (and anthropologists) typically talk about Africa, development, modernity, and progress, how does Ferguson suggest we think about, describe, and support people, practices, and movements for change occurring throughout Africa? Your answer should not be a prescription of a particular policy, but it should highlight Ferguson’s alternative way of knowing, thinking, and acting.

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