Who reaps the benefit? – dual hegemony and the politics of development aid in Bangladesh
department or school: Arts and Sciences, Irving K. Barber School of (Okanagan)
department or school: Community, Culture and Global Studies, Department of (Okanagan)
data provider: DSpace
degree campus: UBCO
creator: Husain, Matt M.
issued: 2019-08-01T16:04:34Z
issued: 2019
related degree: Doctor of Philosophy - PhD
degree grantor: University of British Columbia
description: After a lengthy professional tenure with the World Bank’s Result Measurement Unit, I began to question why development aid to impoverished countries appears to benefit aid facilitators and donors, as well as a few wealthy clients, rather than empowering aid recipients on the ground. My interdisciplinary research project focuses on the poverty reduction industry in Bangladesh’s private and public sectors, where the industry is deeply embedded in the country’s culture and class structures. I analyze development through an examination of those class relations and how they are situated vis-à-vis the politics of development and economic globalization, and how they shape aid delivery mechanisms and aid recipients’ choices in participating in such programs. I begin by illustrating Bangladesh’s complex historical, economic, and political environment. This background information is important to understand the current trajectory of development in Bangladesh. Particularly, I look at how the country’s long and turbulent history of state-building continues to shape class configurations and privatization processes facilitated by the development aid industry. My interdisciplinary research has a fieldwork component, in which I employ a multi-sited approach to data collection through semi-structured interviews, focus group discussions, and participant observation in rural and urban Bangladesh to allow the aid recipients and other members of different social groups to share different aspects of development aid. One of my main findings is that development in Bangladesh relies on dual hegemony, which I articulate as an alliance between the new Bangladeshi political and economic elite and the Western international aid/development industry. I argue that dual hegemony functions in such a way that it erodes the Bangladeshi middle-class and reinforces class and caste differences through the privatization of the public sector and greater fragmentation of civil society. In my conclusions I hi…
aggregated CHO: https://circle.library.ubc.ca/rest/handle/2429/71170
note: WHO REAPS THE BENEFIT? – DUAL HEGEMONY AND THE POLITICS OF DEVELOPMENT AID IN BANGLADESH by Matt M. Husain B.S.B.A., The University of Arizona, 2001 A THESIS SUBMITTED IN PARTIAL FULFILLMENT OF THE REQUIREMENTS FOR THE DEGREE OF DOCTOR OF PHILOSOPHY in THE COLLEGE OF GRADUATE STUDIES (Interdisciplinary Graduate Studies) THE UNIVERSITY OF BRITISH COLUMBIA (Okanagan) July 2019 © Matt M. Husain, 2019 ii The following individuals certify that they have read, and recommend to the College of Graduate Studies for acceptance, a thesis/dissertation entitled: Who Reaps the Benefit? Dual Hegemony and The Politics of Development in Bangladesh submitted by Matt Husain in partial fulfillment of the requirements of the degree of Doctor of Philosophy. John Wagner Supervisor Peter Urmetzer Supervisory Committee Member David Geary Supervisory Committee Member Jasmin Hristov University Examiner Fahimul Quadir External Examiner iii Abstract After a lengthy professional tenure with the World Bank’s Result Measurement Unit, I began to question why development aid to impoverished countries appears to benefit aid facilitators and donors, as well as a few wealthy clients, rather than empowering aid recipients on the ground. My interdisciplinary research project focuses on the poverty reduction industry in Bangladesh’s private and public sectors, where the industry is deeply embedded in the country’s culture and class structures. I analyze development through an examination of those class relations and how they are situated vis-à-vis the politics of development and economic globalization, and how they shape aid delivery mechanisms and aid recipients’ choices in participating in such programs. I begin by illustrating Bangladesh’s complex historical, economic, and political environment. This background information is important to understand the current trajectory of development in Bangladesh. Particularly, I look at how the country’s long and turbulent history of state-building continues to sh…
has type: Thesis/Dissertation
date issued: 2019-09
is shown at: 10.14288/1.0380257
language: eng
degree discipline: Interdisciplinary Studies
provider: Vancouver : University of British Columbia Library
publisher: University of British Columbia
rights: Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International
rights URI: http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/
scholar level: Graduate
type: Text
identifier URI: http://hdl.handle.net/2429/71170