Tag: Development (Page 1 of 2)

The “Creative Crusade”: Settler Colonial Antinomies and Books for Development in the Age of Three Worlds

In November of this year, Jody Mason gave a lecture for the Canadian Literature Centre at the University of Alberta with this same title. What follows is a brief adaptation of one of the central points of the talk about the history of development aid.


“You Can Help,” Vol. 95, file 22, “Overseas Book Centre to: 1973, 1967-1973,” R14041, International Council for Adult Education fonds, LAC.

We might probe the complex and shifting settler colonial identifications of the decades between 1950 and the end of the 1970s period by looking at the history of development assistance, which brought books—key elements of the cultures of new left and sovereigntist nationalisms—together with “development” in actions that framed Canada as a successful model of modernization and decolonization. An important case for such a study is the Overseas Book Centre / Centre du livre pour outre-mer (OBC / CLO), a non-governmental book development program established in Toronto in 1959 by liberal internationalist and adult educator James Robbins (“Roby”) Kidd, Harry Campbell (then Chief Librarian for the Toronto Public Library), Canadian Association for Adult Education member Marion McFarland, and Kurt Swinton (then President of Encyclopedia Britannica Canada).

The OBC had Canadian precedents in non-governmental undertakings like the Canadian Council for Reconstruction Through UNESCO and other book-donation campaigns that responded in the wake of the Second World War to the call of reconstruction. However, in using books as instruments to support international education and what was coming to be called “development” the OBC would not, like the CCRU, aim at Europe; they set their sights instead on the nations of what was coming to be known as the “developing world.”[i] The OBC was committed to the idea that wealthy nations like Canada could, as one organizational history puts it, “help education in the Third World through presentation of books.” The OBC flagship program, “Books for Developing Countries,” had, according to Harry Campbell, a second purpose: to provide a use for surplus books from Toronto libraries and Britannica that would otherwise have been “burned or shredded” (though the OBC also received donated books from publishers, schools, colleges, professional groups, and individuals). Initially the OBC operated from space supplied by Kurt Swinton in an Encyclopedia Britannica warehouse in Toronto where volunteers collected and packed books for shipment; today, the NGO is known as the Canadian Organization for Development Through Education, and it is located in Ottawa.[ii]

As scholars such as Gilbert Rist have demonstrated, the development concept of the postwar years was deeply embedded in older histories of colonialism, though the terminology shifted.[iii] This genesis is important to the OBC / CLO, but here the specific context of settler colonialism must also be accounted for. In speeches such as Roby Kidd’s “I Am What a Librarian Made Me” (1961) or in texts such as Kidd’s An International Development Plan for Canada (1961), Kidd emphasizes that Canada was poised to lead the new “creative crusade.” The nation’s technological and scientific capacities are key to Kidd’s argument, but more important is his attention to the nation’s political status. Canada, he argues, is not “perceived as a threat”:

Other people can accept aid from us without feeling demeaned or becoming fearful that this is the beginning of a new imperialism. Moreover, we ourselves have recently passed out of colonialism and are even now going through rapid industrialization. We seem to be nearer in our own development to what others want to do.[iv]

Kidd’s framing of Canada as having “recently passed out of colonialism” rests on a denial of the internal colonization that structured 1960s Canada. At the same time, his view acknowledges the possibility of continuity between the old imperialism and the new development, while explicitly avoiding Canadian implication in that continuity: this could not be the new colonialism because a former colony was one of its key players. In Kidd’s version of this history, a former colony had caught up to its more “developed” counterparts. It had accomplished what Rist calls the “impossible” feat at the heart of the development paradigm, which holds to both an evolutionist idea of history and an asymptotic representation of growth: “Since time measured by the calendar passes at the same rate for everyone, it is by definition impossible for countries at the bottom to ‘catch up’ those at the top; the gap can only go on widening.” Kidd’s example of Canada seems to affirm this myth rather than disprove it; however, this is more revealing of the particular situation of the settler colony than of any observable truth about development.[v]

A second set of contradictions underwrote the work of the OBC through the 1960s and 70s. While Kidd was using his roles in the new international institutions––he was conference president of the 1960 UNESCO World Conference on Adult Education and chair of UNESCO’s Experimental World Literacy Programme from 1967-1973, for instance––to call for locally relevant and locally produced literacy materials, he was at the same time promoting the book donation model of the OBC. This is despite the fact that an increasing body of research produced at UNESCO through the 1970s was demonstrating that this model was irrelevant at best and neocolonial at worst: studies such as Ronald Barker and Richard Escarpit’s The Book Hunger (1973), for instance, offer a frank assessment of the fact that book donations from the world’s book “producing” nations could not solve acute book shortages in Africa because the greatest need was for books in languages not published in the producing nations; Philip Altbach and Eva Maria Rathgeber’s Publishing in the Third World (1980) critiques the tendency of book donation schemes to undermine fragile local publishing industries by flooding markets with subsidized books.[vi] These arguments are particularly germane to the work of the OBC: between 1960 and 1975, the OBC shipped nearly twenty million books to fifty countries, and almost four hundred tonnes of books (and equipment) were shipped overseas in 1976-77 alone.[vii]


Jody Mason is a member of the Department of English Language and Literature, where she researches the history of literacy and citizenship.


[i] Canada, “Canadian Council for Reconstruction Through UNESCO: Submission to Royal Commission on National Development in the Arts, Letters and Sciences, 1949-1951,” 1-3, Library and Archives Canada, 27 Jan. 2001, collectionscanada.ca/massey/h5-318-e.html. Accessed 10 Feb. 2020.

[ii] Tony Richards, “From Giving to Helping: The Evolution of a Development Agency,” Logos 4,

 no. 1 (January 1993): 26-27. Campbell’s words come from a 1984 correspondence with W.A.

 Teager. W.A. Teager, “Cultural and Humanitarian Activities Leading to an International Role and

 Focus,” in J.R. Kidd: An International Legacy of Learning, edited by Nancy J. Cochrane,

 Vancouver: Centre for Continuing Education, University of BritishColumbia, 1986,” 122-3.

[iii] Gilbert Rist, The History of Development: From Western Origins to Global Faith (London: Zed Books, 2014), 47-79.

[iv] J.R. Kidd, “I Am What A Librarian Made Me,” in Education for Perspective (New Delhi: Indian Adult Education Association, 1969), 89-91; J.R. Kidd, “An International Development Program for Canada,” Feb. 1961, p. 2, 15, Vol. 43, file 15, “JRK – 1950s and 1960s (Cultural Background), 1950-61,”R14041, International Council for Adult Education fonds (ICAE), LAC.

[v] Rist, The History of Development, 45.

[vi] S. Kapoor, J.R. Kidd, and C. Touchette, Functional Literacy and International Development: A Study of Canadian Capability to Assist with the World Campaign to Eradicate Illiteracy (Ottawa: Canadian National Commission for UNESCO, 1968), 23, 27; Ronald Barker and Richard Escarpit, The Book Hunger (Paris: UNESCO, 1973), 24-7; Philip Altbach and Marie-Eve Rathgeber, Publishing in the Third World: Trend Report and Bibliography (New York: Praeger, 1980).

[vii]J.R. Kidd, Roby Kidd: Adult Educator, 1915-1982 (Toronto: OISE Press, 1995),105; “OBC Annual Report, 1976-77,” Vol. 108, file 13, “ICAE (International Council for Adult Education) General Files 1976-80 International Organizations – Society for International Development 1976-80 Overseas Book Centre, 1976-80,” R14041, ICAE-LAC.

CfP: Official Development Assistance at the CHA, Vancouver 2019

Call for Papers for the CNHH sessions at the 2019 CHA Congress.

Deadline to submit: October 1.  


The CNHH sponsored sessions at the Annual Meeting of the Canadian Historical Association in Vancouver in 2019 will be on Official Development Assistance,  especially questions of training and education in the aid field, universities and internationalization, other aspects of settler colonialism and humanitarianism, Canada and international aid organizations, etc.

 

It is coordinated by David Meren, who is preparing a paper on “‘Development’: Settler Colonialism and the Origins, Life and Demise of the United Nations Regional Training Centre for Technical Assistance at UBC”.

 

Please write to him before October 1 <david.meren@umontreal.ca> if you are interested.

CfP: Modern Workship, NACBS Annual Meeting

The next meeting of the North American Conference on British Studies will be held in Providence, RI on October 25-28, 2018.

Theme: “Altruism and its Discontents: Human Rights, Humanitarianism, and Development.”

The deadline to apply is February 15, 2018.

From the NACBS description:

This workshop will explore human rights, humanitarianism, and development in the modern period, c. 1800-2000, through the prism of “altruism.” While usually treated separately, each of these areas of endeavor grapples with often competing interests in projects aimed at improving the lives of others, some altruistic, others less so. We seek papers that engage critically in human rights, humanitarianism, or development, with special consideration for those positioned at their intersections. What has been the relationship between humanitarianism and discourses on human rights and how has it changed over time? How do we explain the dynamics of imperialism, internationalism, and foreign intervention? Humanitarian intervention and development? Or, empire, decolonization, and “development” projects? Where were projects made and unmade and how? What were their costs and who bore them? Where did these discourses or projects fit within anti-colonial resistance or in the civic life of post-colonial societies? While our emphasis is on British engagement in the world, we welcome equally papers that examine the reception of these projects among local populations and/or that put British actors in comparative or international context.

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Global Impact Soirée

By Sandrine Murray

 

On May 9, 2017, CNHH attended Global Impact Soirée, an event highlighting Canadian contributions to international aid.

Tyler Owens and Julia van Drie helped research a film discussing Canada’s history of international aid. It took the work of six CNHH members to identify events, while research assistants Tyler and Julia documented them. The CNHH also helped rejuvenate the slide show of CIDA highlighted at the evening. “25 years of excellence in International Photography,” was brought back online at the CNHH’s request, and is now hosted by the MacOdrum Library at Carleton University.To see the photos, check out the CIDA photo library collection here.

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CfP: How to Change the World. Entangled Histories of Development

Originally posted on H-Net.

Type: Call for Papers
Date: November 1, 2016
Location: China
Subject Fields: 
Contemporary History, Economic History / Studies, Environmental History / Studies, History of Science, Medicine, and Technology, World History / Studies

 

Conference: 26-28 May, 2017

Shanghai University, Shanghai

Organized by College of Liberal Arts, Shanghai University, Shanghai, and Graduate Institute, Geneva.

 

 

Call for Papers

Large part of international policies during the last two hundred years – at least – have been influenced by the idea of “development.” Though the term became an important part of the international discourse only after 1945, the concept is clearly older, rooted in the idea that socio-economic conditions would and should improve and that specific policies should be employed to bring about such improvements. Beyond this core, “development” has been a highly contested concept, whose constructed character has repeatedly been pointed out.

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Investment for Development: The Plodding History of Canadian Development Finance

by Jill Campbell-Miller

posted jointly with Active History.

In the area of development finance Canada has lagged behind its international partners in the G7, only promising to establish a development finance institution (DFI) in the 2015 budget, some 67 years after the UK established the first DFI. This might come as surprise, since blending the interests of domestic Canadian businesses and official development assistance (ODA) has been an objective of the Canadian government since the early days of aid-giving in the 1950s, to the delight of some, and the dismay of others.

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My Visit to Plan Canada’s Head Offices in Toronto

By Carlos Uriel Contreras Flores

 

Hello,

In this post I will let you know my experience in Toronto at the offices of Plan Canada, a visit I made last week.

Some weeks ago, Professor Dominique Marshall asked me to check some irreplaceable documents that Plan Canada had in their offices in Toronto, and that are part of the historical archives of the organization. These are basically letters and photo albums of some of their most important and lasting donors and sponsors.

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Welcome to the New Website

Hello!

Welcome to the new website of the Canadian Network on Humanitarian History: aidhistory.ca. In this website you will find the materialization of the wishes of the members of the network, who expressed their feelings and necessities on what the website should include during the Second Canadian Workshop on the History of Humanitarian Aid, which was held on May 30 2015.

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Looking Foward, Outstanding Things

By Rebecca Henfrey

 

Establishing a Program Mandate; what kind of deliverables are we looking for?

  • Knowledge Mobilization: One of the most important goals of undertaking these projects is demonstrating their practicality. NGOs want you to be able to show that the knowledge you gather has value and from there the community is invested. If there is a formulaic way to do this and potentially demonstrate how this can aid in funding, it can serve to work for both parties involved.
  • Methodology and Information Sharing: This network will be used to share syllabi, teaching resources and materials and workshops. Individuals will be able to blog about their teaching experiences and perhaps elaborate more upon their professional and practical experiences in this field, providing information on their methodologies
  • Networking and Twitter: Twitter can not only be used as a teaching resource, it can also be used as a platform to set up courses and integrate teaching about humanitarian agencies an NGOs into ‘mainstream’ courses as it allows professors to broaden their approach.
  • Module Development and Shared Classes: One potential project that can be undertaken by multiple individuals is the development of modules that can be placed in a classroom or workshop environment. It would be a helpful resource that could be provided to instructors without requiring them to do too much legwork.
  • Cultivation of Collaborative Discussion: The encouragement of collaborative discussion within the website’s forums was identified as a key priority for the program. Finding a way to connect individuals, whether that be for the purposes of scholarly feedback or discussion amongst students, researchers, instructors and other members is very important.
  • Growth of Membership: Once a critical mass of members has been reached, the chances of organizing a conference increase. Currently there is a sense of isolation due to the fact that this is a developing field. One proposed way to encourage membership numbers was to engage postgrad students. Because of the emerging and developing nature of this field, it has to be done organically, from the bottom up with engagement alongside deliverance of information.
  • Attendance of Conferences: Another mandate of this program was to reach out to other historians and practitioners in the field by attending conferences. CCI was listed as a potential
  • Establish methods of relationship buildlng

Final Priorities; as identified and recorded on whiteboard and through discussion

  • Establish and maintain trust between NGOs and Researchers
  • Keep distance and respect in these relationships
  • Look at models of partnership
    1. ODI
    2. Non-State Humanitarianism
  • Humanitarian history as a part of history of imperialism, globalization, development
  • Share readings, contacts
  • Organization of academic panels
  • Publication of special issues of journals
  • Establishment of international networks
  • Teach, supervise and discuss
  • Interest and organize volunteer work
  • Foster inter-disciplinarity in research and work
  • Workshop in NGO building next time?
  • Organize Archives/Research aids
  • Preserve archives
  • Identify content of photos
  • Identify and collect personal collections
  • Conduct oral histories
  • Present history of NGO website
  • Talks to create interest
  • History workshops for new NGO staff, to avoid mistakes and to raise funds

Future Website and Common Research Projects

By Rebecca Henfrey

 

Future website

The second Major discussion of the day centered on the creation of the network’s website. Shawn Antcil, a web developer and designer from Carleton University ran this presentation and recorded the feedback given by members. The following is a brief summary of considerations and proposals put forth by Shawn and other various individuals.

Highlights of Shawn’s Presentation

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