LECTURE 1

ICT for Development

UNDERSTANDING DEVELOPMENT
 Learning Objectives
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 The learning objectives of this lecture is to introduce

learners to:
 The basic concepts of human development
 Millennium Development Goals
 Introduction
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 Unevenness of economic and social change and

development across the world
 Development understood in many ways depending
on disciplines and perspectives
 The role of information and knowledge in making a
difference to lives
 The importance of ICTs as development tools to
enable ‘information literacy’
 Understanding Development
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 Difficult to define and understand

 Development is a highly complex concept, contradictory, and full of
debates and discourses
 Means different things to different people, based on economic,
geographic, political, social, cultural, religious and ethnic contexts.
 Can be viewed from the perspectives of a number of ‘academic
disciplines
 Extensively studied from the 2nd half of 20th C onwards
 The term became synonymous with growth, modernization, change,
democracy, and many similar Western values and in the beginning
was focused largely on economic development
 Understanding Development
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 Three major dominant political perspectives to the

study of economic development
 The Western ‘Free Market’ approach
 Economic indicators such as GNP, GNP per capita, GDP and
GDP per capita
 As GNP and GDP grew, and as per capita income increased,
development would gradually percolate, move or “trickle
down” to the larger population and the poor.
 Many countries adopted this model and the reforms proposed
by international agencies such as the IMF
 there was extensive criticism of the social and political
consequences of such reform
 The economic crisis of 2008 effectively ended this paradigm
 Understanding Development
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 Planned economic approach with extensive state

involvement in planning and management of economic
systems
 The collapse of the erstwhile Soviet Union and many
changes in economic policies in China effectively ended this
paradigm

 The mixed approach with combines the first two

followed by countries such as India until the early
1990s.
 Understanding Development
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 Teams of social scientists from different disciplines

sought to understand the forces that would bring about
change and development at an individual and a larger
societal level
 Drew contrast between ‘traditional’ and ‘modern’
behaviour; and looked at modernization in stages
 Modernization and development for these scholars
meant a move from traditional, community based,
feudalistic societies to ones that stressed innovativeness,
education, political participation and access and
exposure to information that changed people’s way of
thinking.
 Understanding Development
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 Neither mutually exclusive nor exhaustive

 Criticisms of these approaches emerged
 Macro level statistics did not reflect ground reality
 Economic growth did not necessarily lead to poverty
reduction
 High growth rates alongside large scale poverty and
deprivation, inequalities, social disorder and environmental
degradation.
 Understanding the Human Development
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Framework
 A new paradigm on development emerged which
looked at the process of development through a
more people centred and humane approach

 Pioneered by the work of Mahbub ul Haq and

Amartya Sen

 The human development approach was introduced

by the United Nations Development Programme
(UNDP) in 1990 and supported later by other
international organizations
 Understanding the Human Development
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Framework
 Stresses human well-being as an end for any
process of economic and social development.

 Overturning the view that focuses on material

progress as the sole end.

 Instead, the new approach focuses on the well-being

of individuals as the ultimate objective.
 Understanding the Human Development
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Framework
 Embedded as the guiding principle on which the
annual Human Development Reports (HDR) are
based.

 HDR combines annual thematic presentations,

preceded by definition, measurement, and policy
analysis of indicators of education, health, and
income sufficient to ensure adequate living
standards, to develop the Human Development
Index.
 Understanding the Human Development
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Framework
 The Human Development Reports are based on five development
indices
 the human development index (HDI);
 the human poverty index 1 (HPI 1) for developing countries and
 the human poverty index 2 (HPI 2) for selected Organization for Economic
Cooperation and Development (OECD) countries;
 the Gender Related Development Index (GDI); and the Gender
Empowerment Measure (GEM).

 Each of these is developed using different dimensions and indicators.

And finally, they are analyzed leading to the Human development
Report

 The HDI is the average of measures of three indices: life expectancy,

education/literacy, and standard of living.
 Understanding the Human Development
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Framework
 Produced by UNDP

 Other multinational agencies and in fact, countries produce their own

annual development reports, e.g.

 UNICEF brings out State of the Children

 ITU brings out ICT Development Report

 World Bank brings out its own reports

 UNESCO brings out Global Monitoring Report on Education…

 The HDI from 1970-2010
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http://hdrstats.undp.org/en/countries/profiles/MDV.html
 The HDI from 1970-2010
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 There have been improvements in all aspects of

human development—life expectancy, literacy, and
income levels
 Gap between developed and developing countries
remains high
 The HDI from 1970-2010
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 The human development approach has changed the

way that the world currently looks at development.

 This view is reflected both at international debates

and underscores the commitment given by the
global community to actively pursue development

 A major such commitment is reflected in the

Millennium Development Goals
 The Millennium Development Goals
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(MDGs)
 The most broadly supported and specific poverty
reduction strategies that the world has committed itself
to

 Common denominator to which all countries, irrespective

of their ideological, political, or cultural affiliations,
have adhered

 Each and every stakeholder in the global community

accepted the common goals, targets, and strategies for
achieving them
18
 Managing Development
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 Management of development in a developing country is a

political and ethical process,
 Use of power and good governance to bring about desired
goals in contexts characterized by conflicts of interests, values
and agendas and shrinking resources.
 Consists of
 policy making and setting development goals,
 identifying priorities,
 developing and establishing enabling legislations and regulatory
practices,
 working with different organizations in government and out of it;
 engaging with citizens both to provide access to and provision of
services and social accountability;
 monitoring and evaluation to ensure that there is progress.
 Managing Development
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 Principles upon which current perspectives of human

development build
 Inclusiveness—a pattern of growth that allows all people to
contribute to and benefit from the development process
 Equality—that all citizens are equal but there are inherent
inequalities in any society. Therefore, a policy which enables
systematically disadvantaged and vulnerable groups to share in
development through positive discrimination is necessary to ensure
that benefits reach them.
 Quality—that is not just the provisioning of services, but ensuring
that these services are of good quality
 Accountability—that citizens are partners in the development
process and that governments need to engage with them and be
held accountable to the citizens.
 Points to Remember
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• The human development approach is a new paradigm on

development which looks at the process of development through a
more people centred and humane approach.

• This approach is best exemplified in the Human Development Index

and the Human Development Reports

• Global development goals are currently based on the human

development approach

• Even after 2015, The Millennium Development Goals have to be seen

more as a road map toward progress rather than end posts in
themselves.