If the 1960s were characterized by the great hope of seeing an irreversible process of development launched throughout what came to be called the Third World, and in Africa particularly, the present age is one of disillusionment. Development has broken down, its theory is in crisis, its ideology the subject of doubt. Agreement on failure in Africa is sadly general.
Opinions are more varied in regard to Asia and Latin America.
Some emphasize the economic successes of the newly industrializing countries, such as South Korea, Brazil and India, and conclude that the only possible development is one that intelligently succumbs to the increasing worldwide expansion of all economies on the earth. These examples should be followed, and the illusions of alternative paths to the transnational model abandoned, since, in the meantime, socialism is itself in crisis in the countries of the East, and the Third World countries who look to them for inspiration, and the socialist countries themselves are obliged to yield to a harrowing revisionism and are seeking reintegration in the expansion of a world economy. In this book it is proposed to analyse this failure of development from a political stand-point, for discussion of the options in the framework of macroeconomic schema provides no more than commonplace and foreseeable findings. We must aim higher and integrate in the discussion all the economic, political, social and cultural facets of the problem and at the same time fit them into a local framework that takes account of interaction on a world scale. We acknowledge that this aim comes up against major theoretical difficulties.