What were the origins of British ideas on rural poverty, and how did they shape development practice in Malawi? How did the international development narrative influence the poverty discourse in postcolonial Malawi from the 1960s onwards? In The State and the Legacies of British Colonial Development in Malawi: Confronting Poverty, 1939-1983, Gift Wasambo Kayira addresses these questions. Although by no means rehabilitating colonialism, the book argues that the intentions of officials and agencies charged with delivering economic development programs were never as ill-informed or wicked as some theorists have contended. Raising rural populations from poverty was on the agenda before and after independence. How to reconcile the pressing demand of stabilizing the country's economy and alleviating rural poverty within the context of limited resources proved an impossible task to achieve. Also difficult was how to reconcile the interests of outside experts influenced by international geopolitics and theories of economic development and those of local personnel and politicians,. As a result, development efforts always fell short of their goals. Through a meticulous search of the archive on rural and industrial development projects, Kayira presents a development history that displays the shortfalls of existing works on development inadequately grounded in historical study.
Gift Wasambo Kayira is senior lecturer of history at the University of Malawi.
List of Figures, Tables, and Maps Preface Acknowledgements List of Abbreviations Introduction Chapter One: The Poor and British Development Discourse in Africa, 1909-1970s Chapter Two: The Land-poverty Nexus in Colonial Malawi, 1930s-1965 Chapter Three: Whose Interests? The State, Industry, and Rural Development, 1930s-1953 Chapter Four: Confronting Poverty: The State, ODM and World Bank Triad, 1960s-1970s Chapter Five: Experts, Planners, and the Tampered Rural Development, 1960s-1981 Chapter Six: Malawi's Foreign Policy and the Fruitless Search for Investment Capital, 1960s-1980 Conclusion: Some Reflections on the State and the War on Poverty Bibliography Index About the Author
"Gift Wasambo Kayira has produced a fine and meticulously researched volume on modern Malawi's long fight to eradicate poverty. Efforts by domestic and international experts have unfortunately yielded very little positive outcomes. Timely published when Malawi is struggling with high levels of unemployment, corruption, economic instability, and low levels of agricultural production, this book is a must read for academicians and stakeholders in both government agencies and local and international non-governmental organizations." -- Paul C. Banda, Tarleton State University
