IDST 1002H Study Guide - Winter 2018, Comprehensive Midterm Notes - Developing Country, World Bank, Neoliberalism
12 Oct 2018
School
Department
Course
Professor
IDST 1002H
MIDTERM EXAM
STUDY GUIDE
Fall 2018
Lecture 1: Multidimensional poverty, development ethics and human rights
Our World Today
• China is trying to transition to most green economy and become global leader in free
trade
• US is supporting hydrocarbons and trade restrictions
• Countries like China that are becoming more important have different ideals than former
leaders such as US
• Globalization: increasing role of cross border trade and investment that takes place on a
global scale
• Peaked 2008 and has slowed down since
• Inequalities within countries are historically unparalleled
• Majority of population lives in urban areas, which until 10 years ago was not true
• Automation is going to affect types of jobs available, information technology will affect
how we work in the jobs we have
• Increasing attraction to nationalism
• Too many people do not want to hear a diverse set of voices
Development
Unilinear development thinking:
1. Progress (universal meaning)
2. A universal path to progress (involves science, investment, urbanization, economic
growth)
3. A lack of sensitivity to alternative paths
Modernization theory: set of ideas that developed in 1950s and continue to be dominant way of
thinking about development
• What the 3 parts of unilateral development thinking falls under
Belief that nationally based economic production is central matter to evaluate progress
• Emphasis on growth and production might hide other ways of thinking what development
might be
Money metric methods of measuring development: using money threshold to divide poor from
not poor
• People all around the world share some basic values
• Amartya Sen argues poverty around the world is not just a lack of money, but it is a lack
of capability to realize one’s full potential as a human being
• The freedom to choose the life you want to lead
• Capability Theory led to Sen receiving Nobel Prize
A state of ill-being (people do not have capability to live a life they value):
• Voicelessness and powerlessness
• Undeserved and avoidable suffering
• Deliberate exclusion from society
• Collateral damage from processes of development as a universal progress
• Disadvantageous incorporation into economic life
A state of well-being (people do have capability to live life they value):
• Personal relationships and friendships
• Intellectual and spiritual life
• Social participation and contribution
Any process towards a state of well-being involves making choices that will result in tradeoffs,
decreasing the wellbeing of some to improve the wellbeing of others
find more resources at oneclass.com
find more resources at oneclass.com
• Economic gains should bring benefits for everyone, but very often only benefits a small
group of people, and often many lose out
Development ethics: how we make choices over how we move forward into a collective future
that expresses our individual and collective values
1. Which values?
2. Who gains and who loses?
3. What is the origin of unfairness?
4. How to make choices between two groups that have different values?
5. How to construct alternatives?
6. How to resist?
The dimensions of development ethics:
1. Poverty is both undeserved and removable
2. It involves important questions
a. What are the true costs and benefits of development?
b. What is the significance of culture?
c. To what extent are values culturally relative?
d. Can the extent of culturally relative values be justified?
3. What is the appropriate distribution over time in bringing about development that has
consequences for the future?
4. Who bears responsibility?
5. Who should be consulted?
Three philosophical traditions underlie development ethics:
1. Natural law ethics (ethical implications of development are based upon nature of human
beings and their interaction with the environment)
2. Utilitarianism (grew out of rational calculation that costs and benefits of development
can be measured, summed, and compared)
3. Social conflict theory (do participants in the process of development freely agree to it?)
Possible distributions:
1. Equal treatment
2. Equal outcomes
3. Fulfil basic minimum rights
4. Minimize harm and neglect
Four foremost human rights agreements:
1. The 1948 Universal Declaration of Human Rights
a. Article 28 of UDHR (everyone has right to international and social order that
recognizes their rights) requires international cooperation because
2. The 1966 human rights covenants on civil and political rights
3. The 1966 human rights covenants on economic, social, and cultural rights
4. The 1998 ILO (International Labour Organization) Declaration of Fundamental Principles
and Rights at Work
Human rights: moral principles that describe certain standards of behaviour and are protected
by the law, apply to everyone, everywhere, and at all times
• We are rights holder, and duty bearers (we cannot infringe on rights of others)
1. Civil and political rights: individualistic
2. Economic, social, and cultural rights: collective
• Routinely overlooked by states
find more resources at oneclass.com
find more resources at oneclass.com
Document Summary
Lecture 1: multidimensional poverty, development ethics and human rights. Increasing attraction to nationalism: too many people do not want to hear a diverse set of voices. Unilinear development thinking: progress (universal meaning, a universal path to progress (involves science, investment, urbanization, economic growth, a lack of sensitivity to alternative paths. Modernization theory: set of ideas that developed in 1950s and continue to be dominant way of thinking about development: what the 3 parts of unilateral development thinking falls under. Belief that nationally based economic production is central matter to evaluate progress: emphasis on growth and production might hide other ways of thinking what development might be. A state of well-being (people do have capability to live life they value): personal relationships and friendships, social participation and contribution. Possible distributions: equal treatment, equal outcomes, fulfil basic minimum rights, minimize harm and neglect. 3 doctrines of development: understanding the present, improving the future, intervening in the present.
