Understanding Development Governance: Concepts, Institutions, and Processes

The decolonized developing nations in Asia, Africa, and Latin America have been struggling since the end of World War II to overcome the scourge of poverty and human misery and to lift living standards to reasonable and satisfactory levels. Post-colonial development strategies generally faltered in attacking poverty and were only partly productive in alleviating social malaise. For several decades, development was equated with economic growth measured purely in terms of economic variables such as GDP, per capita income, rate of investments, or industrial productivity, yet the masses of the poor or the impoverished rural areas were virtually excluded from the benefits that flowed from such piecemeal economic growth.