Participatory Development and the Appropriation of Agency in Southern Tanzania

Abstract

Ideologies of participatory development promoted by development organizations in Tanzania are at odds with popular aspirations. Popular understandings of development emphasize individual achievement in a context of social differentiation, in what amounts to a recognition of the importance of individual agency in bringing about social transformation. Despite the claims of participatory development ideologies to foster the empowerment of the poor, the interventions it promotes are premised on a denial of poor people’s capacity to bring about change for themselves. Agency can only be effected through the imposed institutional structures for participation.