From a critical historical perspective the course focuses on the historical foundation of the problems of development and its manifestations in various locations and over time until the present. As a student you will have the opportunity to interpret a range of important political, economic, social and cultural conditions and processes including their origin and consequences from various theoretical perspectives, and at multiple analytical levels and scales.

The course will introduce you to a broad historical view of colonial processes in three continents followed by a wide-ranging critical theoretical discussion of colonial and imperialist history. This is followed by a critical discussion of development strategies in independent and decolonised countries. Proceeding from the historical struggles for political control and the exploitation and control of natural resources in colonial Africa, Asia, and Latin America the course traces, analyses and compares various development paths and strategies in the three continents, as well as in specific countries. The analysis will search out internal and external driving forces of the processes and assess their outcomes. You will have the chance to critically examine feminist critique of colonialism, images created by the West of the East (orientalism) and by the East of the West (occidentalism) through the lenses of post-modern and post colonial theory.

Further information: master [at] sam [dot] lu [dot] se