New Directions for the Sociology of Development

Abstract

At the close of World War II, “development” began to evolve along two paths. On the first path, scholars aimed to generate theoretical understandings of social change, especially at the national level (development studies). On the second path, policy makers in governments and other development-focused organizations initiated actions to promote positive social change, especially in poor or war-torn nations (development practice). In this article, we review the recent trajectory of “development” in sociology, paying close attention to the intersections between development studies and development practice. Through explicit comparisons to economics and political science, we demonstrate how the prominence of development sociology has varied historically in relation to its proposed policy prescriptions. We conclude by highlighting five uniquely sociological contributions that could powerfully improve contemporary interdisciplinary development conversations, and by calling for greater sociological attention to the complex ways in which a growing transnational field of development practitioners is shaping a multiplicity of development outcomes.

Estimating Treatment Heterogeneity of International Monetary Fund Programs on Child Poverty with Generalized Random Forest

“…A common critique of social policy studies focusing on developing countries is that governments tend not to implement anti-poverty policies well enough (Rothstein 2014), or that corruption erodes any benefits social policies may bring (Dumas, Wedel, and Callman 2010). Therefore, studies of developing societies tend to-or should-focus instead on other proxies affecting poverty: economic development, informal economies, corruption, and institutions (Viterna and Robertson 2015). However, our findings show that more can be gained by further crossfertilizing these two research traditions, mainly divided by regional interest but not necessarily any substantive differences.…”

“…Second, the intellectual insulation between macro and micro perspectives of the study of crisis and poverty has created a geographical fault line between studies of Global North and South (Brady and Burton 2016;Viterna and Robertson 2015). While macro oriented political economy studies tend to focus on the global system, micro oriented family sociology and welfare studies have a Global-North focus (Esping-Andersen 1990;Garfinkel et al 2016;Korpi and Palme 1998;McLanahan 2009;McLanahan and Percheski 2008).…”

“…Welfare and political economy studies have devoted considerable energy to investigating the effects of IMF austerity programs (Babb 2005). This article focus on the Global South as a complement to the Global North focused family sociology literature (Viterna and Robertson 2015). To this end, we analyze large data combining societal, family, and child-level samples of about 2 million children residing in 67 of these societies.…”

Optimising the Role of Sub-Saharan African Remittance Senders in Sustainable Development

“…Ratner's work raises questions about who uses 'sustainability language' and the social, political, and economic functions it serves. Viterna and Robertson (2015) and Hindess (1986, as cited by Long, 2001) focus their attention on development actors who engage directly with processes and projects with stated goals of promoting development. For Viterna and Robertson (2015:35), these actors may be development organisations or NGOs who hold power at the local level with little accountability to the states or civilians impacted by the projects they implement.…”

“…The works of Ratner (2004), Viterna andRobertson (2015), andHindess (1986) give us insight into the social actors whose competing interests and actions impact the ways in which meaning is created and development is understood and operationalised. These authors do not examine remittance senders as such, but their perspectives are relevant to understanding the interests and interactions of those who send remittances and other development actors including states, development agencies, NGOs, and international organisations.…”