Modernization theory and dependencia: Why did they fail?
April 3, 2008by: Martina Schuster
By the end of the 1980s the debate about the failure of grand development theories was well underway. Economists, politicians, and academics bemoaned the end of the Third World and declared former theories (some of them quite well known) worthless.
Theories tend to form “theory families”; the discussion here will center on the modernization theories of the 1950s and 60s and the dependencia theories of the 60s and 70s.
The supporters of modernization theories assumed that a linear process exists whereby developing countries progressively become industrialized. Reasons for the underdevelopment of countries were seen within the different societies in internal factors, for example, in their traditions or in the lack of sufficient capital investment.
Theories around dependencia were based on the assumption that the historical process of the spread of capitalism resulted in the underdevelopment of the periphery, which they called the Third World. External factors like colonialism, the capitalist world economy and world market integration were considered responsible for the lag in the periphery`s development. (Muerle: 9-10)
In the last ten years these theories have been vehemently criticized and to many scholars they are nothing more than theory ruins. The following points of criticism have been most frequently mentioned:
I. Differences within the Third World
The success of the “Asian tigers” has been the most recent example that theoretical assumptions have been wrong. The typical underdeveloped country did not exist, there were no identical economic and social structures in all Third World countries. Taiwan in particular soon had more the profile of an OECD member state than that of a developing country. According to the assumptions of dependencia the integration of Asian countries into the world market should have ended in a disaster, at least in a continuing development of underdevelopment. At the same time, the debt crisis in Latin America called their recommendation of import substitution industrialization (ISI) into question. On the authority of modernization theories all countries should have experienced the same change. On the other hand, they had also seen Confucianist ethics as an obstacle for development. (Stock 1996: 13) With the distinct success of these states it became clear that the same categories could not be applied to all countries. Now these theorists had to take into account that major differences existed, for example, between the tiger states, the annuity capital oil countries and the agrarian societies of Africa. Some authors doubt that the Third World ever existed: “it is only a product of our roughly hewn analytical categories” (Boeckh 1993: 111).
II. Problems inherent in the theories
The main argument made against grand theories is that they raise their heuristic concepts to the level of universal theories of reality. Some authors complain that the hypotheses were empirically poorly underpinned. Others criticize that explanations were generalized from the level of theory down to the particular objects in question.
Another common critique maintains that these theories are one-dimensional: Modernization theories reduce the reasons for underdevelopment to internal, the dependencia to external factors. The latter restricted their object of investigation to the economy of the country. Boeckh criticized furthermore that dependencia did not consider that their descriptions of the periphery-capitalistic development deficits were in reality typical metropolitan industrial capitalist development. (Boeckh 1993: 114)
Another problem is their ahistoricity. Although supporters of dependencia criticized exactly this point regarding modernization theories, they were not able to do justice to this demand themselves. In their studies, history started at the time of colonialization and they did not take special features of the precolonialist and colonialist time into consideration. They did not take into account the divergent features of different modes of colonialisation.
III. Ideologization
The reception of the theories is another crucial point in explaining their failure. Not only were they seen as an explanation for the process of development and underdevelopment, they also became programmatic for global politics and social strategies. Ideals and hopes for the future of the Third World were projected onto both theories. The model for the supporters of modernization theories was U.S. society. Within the dependencia camp, socialist ideals predominated and the hope for a fundamental change in Third World societies in an anti-imperialist context, free from the dominant U.S. capital. Not only the Third World solidarity movement (Menzel 1991: 19) saw in the arguments of the proponents of dependencia theories the only solution for a better future for their countries, especially in Latin America and Africa.
Due to this idealization, supporters of both theory-families did not accept any arguments of the other, two antagonistic camps were pitched against eachother. As a result, the self- correction of both camps was impaired.
Some authors criticize as well the academic dynamics, i.e. the need of some scholars to give themselves a certain image in their own camp. They tried to distinguish themselves from the other theories and were not aware of sharing the same deficits. (Menzel 1991: 17-28)
IV. Crisis of the idea of progress
Until the 1970s the object of the efforts of all development theories was that developing countries should become modern industrial societies. For the supporters of the modernization theories the model was the USA, the advocates of dependencia looked toward societies with metropolitan centers and socialist politics. The Third World countries themselves did not have alternative development concepts. Historically they had suffered the experience of oppression and saw no way to overcome it, except by imitating the Western path.
In the 1970s a new debate started. Reaching the standard of the industrial countries was no longer the goal; now the fulfillment of the basic subsistence needs of the population was demanded.
Later the discussion of the ecological consequences of the Western industrial and consumer model showed that the former idea of following the path toward development of the OECD countries would end in disaster. (Boeckh 1993: 118) ‘Sustainable development’ was now the new motto for many scholars and politicians, the former uniform development idea broke off. Now there even exist fundamental critics who not only reject the Western path toward development but also the idea of “developing” something at all. (Esteva 1992: 65-111)
V. Consequences of the crisis of the global theories
The modernization and dependencia theories did not fail completely, they only failed to live up to their own goals. They cannot stand as development concepts for all Third World countries, but they can serve as an analytic framework for future research. Predictions regarding the probability of development, stagnation or underdevelopment require a comparative typology of paths of development that has yet to be written. Categories and concepts from grand theories that name the internal and external conditions of development could then be useful.
Grand theories are not completely without merit. The dependencia theories discovered the importance, for example, of the historical conditions of underdevelopment. Concepts like structural heterogeneity, which came out of these theories, are still extremely useful, as it explains how economic growth and widespread poverty can coexist. Modernization theories allowed the integration of the cultural dimension in development research.
In light of the weaknesses of modernization and dependencia theories, current thinking has moved away from global explanations, with the exception of neoliberalist paradigms. “Mid-range” theories such as postmodernism focus on the relationship between actors and structures, free agency and systemic coercions. (Muerle 1997: 16) New, long overdue topics such as ecology and gender studies are also coming into play.
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STOCK, C. 1996: Totaler Theorieverzicht? Bilanz der Entwicklungstheoretischen und politischen Diskussion der 90er Jahre, in: blätter des iz3w, Nr. 213, S. 13-16.
Make a “grand” theory for all type of society in the world just positivism dream. All category of country based had their own term of value. Modernization theoris make it forces integration under the development flag, that make identity-bias.