A young girl runs up the hill carrying amanta,a square cloth used for carrying loads on the back. She wanders along paths and fields looking forbosta,dried cow dung, for her mother to use as stove fuel. She comes back, herding the cattle belonging to her parents and grandparents, which had been grazing on the stubble of a harvested field all day. The faded manta on her back is full.

The girl was my god-daughter, Melia,¹ a lovely happy child. In 1998 when I watched her set off laughing after school and meander back, I thought of...

In this chapter I set out the concepts that underpin the analysis in this book. I begin by sketching the structure of capitalism, with a brief note on the unfolding of capitalism in Peru. This is followed by a discussion of definitions of development, with an emphasis on how development is linked to capitalist expansion. I then map the main development actors to show how they are linked to general historical trends. Finally, I discuss the relationship between anthropology and development, and use a famous development project in Vicos, Peru, to illustrate a history of trends in development practice.

This...

The Peruvian national anthem proudly proclaims that Peruvians are free and will ever be so. Inaugurated in the heady days after independence from Spain in 1821, the anthem denounces the ʹambitious Iberian tyrantʹ (el tirano ambicioso Iberino), now overcome through the hatred and vengeance inherited from the Inca Lord (el odio y venganza que heredara de su Inca y Señor). The irony of acriolloelite invoking the empire their Spanish forebears overthrew, with the help of a significant part of the indigenous population, as they established a new political order that continued the subordinate role of the indigenous people,...

Communityis an important keyword in development practice. How it is defined and what the implications are for its mode of implementation in practice are thus central issues. Williamsʹ observation that community can refer to both existing and alternative groups is very relevant in development practice, as we will see. In this chapter I review conceptual and instrumental framings of community and place Allpachico in the context of a specific Peruvian understanding of the term. I begin by reviewing briefly some of the ways in which community is invoked in development and then turn to focus on how the relationship...

This proverb is so well known it has become the name of a non-governmental development organization (seewww.teachamantofish.org.uk). Its philosophy underwrites a couple of development assumptions: that poverty is the problem, to be resolved by supporting income generation; and that this support may involve a variety of ancillary elements such as education. At the same time, it assumes the problem is with the ʹmanʹ and his failure to know how to make use of available resources. This chapter shows the flaws of this view.

In the late 1980s, Allpachico was the beneficiary of a community-based Integrated Rural Development project, led...

In this chapter we turn from development processes that focus on communities to those that work with people selected for a specific characteristic, such as gender, age, or parenthood. Although ʹcommunityʹ retains an irresistible attraction as a forum of development, by the 1970s it was recognized that communities were not harmonious homogeneous wholes. The trend towards disaggregating societies had begun much earlier – Foucault (1973) asserts that it was a mark of modernism to analyse and categorize the constituent parts of the social world as well as the physical one. Attention to addressing the needs and rights of individuals in...

Chapter 5 examined an NGO-led project, focusing on the Integrated Rural Development/Basic Human Needs approach it represented. Here we reflect in greater depth on the NGO form of delivery itself. In the 1980s around the world, NGOs became the delivery agents of choice in development, alongside the global spread of a neo-liberal economic system (Mitlin, Hickey, and Bebbington 2007). Governments downsized, and work formerly under the purview of the state, as well as development aid in general, was taken up by NGOs, themselves often staffed by out of work civil servants (Gill 1997) or unemployed social scientists (Ávila Molero 2000:...

In this chapter, I return to the state as actor in development. In a radical shift from the big projects described in chapters 5 and 7 that were run by NGOs, the state has become the major source of development funds through municipal participatory budgeting. Gradually, beginning in the late 1990s Allpachico started to get more resources from the municipal district to which it belonged, Piedra Blanca. Don Jorge, serving a term as president of the comunidad campesina in 2004, was enthusiastic. ʹWe used to just get what we called a subsidy,ʹ he said, ʹ400 or 500 soles that didnʹt...

This examination of development projects in Allpachico has demonstrated mixed results. On the positive side of the ledger, Allpachico now has residential running water, a sewer system, electricity, and a new school, and some people have used participation in projects to get food or income to help them survive economic crisis or general poverty. But there have also been failures, unintended consequences and accompanying effects. In the introduction I sketched the theoretical architecture for this book, delineating an historically informed political economy analysis of development, involving actors who strategize with the tools and barriers offered by the immediate and larger...