Their Future: A History of Ahistoricism in International Development

Gubser argues that those providing economic development assistance need to better understand the past. Aid workers ignore history when designing and assessing programs. Planners neglect local circumstances that might usefully inform the structuring of programs and activities. Ignorance of the past prevents practitioners from drawing lessons from the broader history of development assistance, while neglect of comparative experience prevents them from transferring approaches that succeed in one national context to another. This ahistoricism is regrettable but understandable: bureaucratic pressures and managerial routines leave aid workers with little time for research and study, while the abstract models of development theorists tend to overlook particularities. The author’s clarion call for reintroducing history into the theory and practice of international development is especially timely given the political challenges and threats to foreign aid institutions in the United States and elsewhere.