Ideas for Development by Robert Chambers

by Robert Chambers

"In Ideas for Development, Robert Chambers, one of the critical optimists of international development, points to the scope that all development actors have to find good things to do. He argues that practical potentials can be found in ideas and aspects of development that have previously been overlooked, undervalued or misunderstood. Each chapter presents and reviews one of his earlier writings, examines subsequent and contemporary experience, and then derives a wealth of conclusions and implications for the future. The many ideas and opportunities narrowing the gaps between words and actions; reducing demands on administrative capacity; using minimum rules, non-negotiables and downward accountability to transform power relations; finding new potentials for participation; improving scaling up; critical reflection and experiential learning; complementing rights-based with obligations-based approaches; pro-poor realism; and responsible well-being." Ideas for Development is for all who are concerned with development, regardless of profession, discipline or organization. Especially it is for policy-makers, practitioners, managers, consultants, researchers, teachers, trainers and students, and those who work in aid agencies, governments, universities and colleges, NGOs and the private sector. Readers are invited to use and improve on the ideas in the book, and to take forward the conclusions that more can be done than many development actors realize, and that in the end it is action that counts.

Hardcover

First published March 3, 2005

About the author

There is more than one Robert Chambers in the Goodreads Library

Robert John Haylock Chambers (1932-) is a British academic and development practitioner. He spent his academic career at the Institute of Development Studies, University of Sussex. In 2013 he became an honorary fellow of the International Institute of Social Studies. He has been one of the leading advocates for putting the poor, destitute and marginalized at the center of the processes of development policy since the 1980s. In particular he argues they should be taken into account when the development problem is identified, policy formulated and projects implemented. He popularized within development circles such phrases as "putting the last first" and stressed the now generally accepted need for development professionals to be critically self-aware. The widespread acceptance of a "participatory" approach is in part due to his work. This includes participatory rural appraisal.

Robert Chambers and G.R. Conway provided the first elaborated definition of the concept of sustainable livelihoods which reads: "a livelihood comprises the capabilities, assets (stores, resources, claims and access) and activities required for a means of living: a livelihood is sustainable which can cope with and recover from stress and shocks, maintain or enhance its capabilities and assets, and provide sustainable livelihood opportunities for the next generation; and which contributes net benefits too there livelihoods at the local and global levels and in the short and long term"