How Not To Go ‘Back To Normal’ After COVID-19: Planning For Post-Neoliberal Development

By Giuseppe Feola, Bram Büscher, Andrew Fischer and Martijn Koster

COVID-19 has shaken the world. Early emergency responses across the world led to drastic changes in local and global development trajectories within a very short period of time, from food insecurity, schooling and gender inequality, to debt and employment crises in much of the Global South, among other changes. A year on and despite the rollout of vaccines in many countries, it remains to be seen whether the pandemic will dissipate; not least because of the starkly unequal distribution of vaccines within and across countries, which is ethically reprehensible and epidemiologically unsound. Given this deep rupture to pre-COVID-19 business-as-usual and the severe adjustments that continue to be made, it is clear that we will not get ‘back to normal’ any time soon, if ever. Nor indeed should we. But how not to go back to normal? Continue reading “How Not To Go ‘Back To Normal’ After COVID-19: Planning For Post-Neoliberal Development”

It is time to abandon “development” goals and demand a post-2030 Utopia

By Julia Schöneberg and Mia Kristin Häckl

These are troubled times. Times of multiple, interrelated crises that bring to the fore the injustices, inequalities, and racisms that are not new, but continue to persist and become increasingly hard to ignore.

The SDGs started off ambitiously and claimed to set a mark for a new era in which all countries would be unified in a universal – shared but differentiated – quest to develop. Much has been critiqued in terms of how the goals are formulated and implemented. Continue reading “It is time to abandon “development” goals and demand a post-2030 Utopia”

Contending Regions? A geographical approach to the 2030 Agenda

What are the most crucial changes brought about by the SDGs? Where does the Agenda 2030 leave Latin America and Africa? What can we as researchers do? And do we need new economic perspectives such as degrowth to achieve sustainable development? 

The panel session at the recent EADI Directors’ Meeting in Cordoba raised more questions than it provided answers – which did not come unexpected, given that the SDGs are far from being implemented in any country of the world. At the same time, all discussants agreed that the world requires more than typical business-as-usual approaches. But as always, the devil is in the detail… Continue reading “Contending Regions? A geographical approach to the 2030 Agenda”