ABSTRACT
Scholars, international development personnel, social activists, and the media are deeply troubled by the growing gap between the social and economic development of industrialized countries of the West and that of the developing countries. This chapter argues that the social science knowledge to understand western societies and their problems was allowed to invade the struggling areas of development studies, paying little or no attention to what in fact had been their historical and social experiences and what, therefore, would trigger their own peculiar development processes. Apart from the plurality of development experiences of western and non-western countries, there is also the countries' internal diversity. This is particularly true of the continental-sized countries like China and India. Development theory at this stage needs its own road warriors who can survive the barbs and ridicule of social science proper until it earns its own intellectual respectability.
