Understanding Impoverishment: The Consequences of Development-Induced Displacement (Refugee and Forced Migration Studies)

Infrastructure development projects are set to continue into the next century as developing country governments seek to manage population growth, urbanization and industrial-ization. The contributions in this volume raise many questions about development and progress in the late twentieth century. What is revealed are the enormous problems and disastrous effects which continue to accompany displacement operations in many countries, which raise the ever more urgent question of whether the benefits of infrastructural development justify and outweigh the pain of the radical disruption of peoples lives, exacerbated by the fact that, with some notable exceptions, there has been a lack of official recognition on the part of governments and international agencies that development-induced displacement is a problem at all. This important volume addresses the issue and shows just how serious the situation is. Two major results of development initiatives are identified that force the uprooting of populations: impoverishment and resistance to resettlement. However, the authors do not present a facile and blanket critique of development, although they do not shy away from exposing the delusion and disappointment of development the social costs are cataloged in detail and contextualized through case studies of infrastructure projects undertaken in India, Brazil, Mexico, Africa and the Philippines. The general conclusion to be drawn from these papers is not that development is obsolete, but rather that development-created displacement is avoidable, and that its harmful effects can be mitigated through more enlightened national and international policies.