ABSTRACT
After more than half a century of experience, the development sector is still haunted by ‘old spectres’ such as the effectiveness of development cooperation; human rights in development; and conditionality versus corruption. The fact that politicians, academics and development practitioners alike are vexed by these questions has led critics to conclude that development cooperation has had no measurable effect on development (Bauer 1988; Dichter 2003). 1 It is not this chapter’s intention to engage in this debate, rather, it argues that development cooperation might be helped if we would shed the “orthodoxy of development” and open our eyes to the implications of the development of the newly emerging economies. I will substantiate this by zooming in on one of them: China. After a brief introduction on the relevance of the Chinese case for our understanding of development, the chapter will turn to a detailed analysis of China’s development by focusing on its pragmatic nature. It will be demonstrated that Chinese pragmatism is built on the principles of credibility and gradualism. This will be demonstrated by examining the type and timing with which core institutions are (or aren’t) introduced into society.
