The international development bank and the making of postcolonial subjectivities

Abstract

This thesis is about subjectivity. It is a critique and problematization of the concept of development, and takes a poststructural/postcolonial approach to examine how the Inter-American Development Bank (IDB) shapes an underdeveloped subjectivity in the people of Latin America through representation (Said, 1978) and dependency (Rodney, 1972). I focus on the IDB’s influence on the people, in terms of identity work, making them subjects of underdevelopment, that is, people who are conditioned to see themselves as underdeveloped, and thus continuously seek financial assistance from international development organizations, resulting in increases in poverty and external debt. In applying a Foucauldian influenced approach to Critical Discourse Analysis (CDA) which looks at the “actors, relationships and practices that characterize the specific issue that is being studied” (Phillips & Hardy, 2002), this thesis examines how the discourses flowing from the communications of the four presidents who have led the IDB thus far, Felipe Herrera (1960-1971), Antonio Ortiz Mena (1971-1988), Enrique V. Iglesias (1988- 2005) and Luis Alberto Moreno (2005-present), work together with organizational practices which function as discursive practices (Foucault, 1972, 1980a, 1981) in shaping an underdeveloped mindset in the people of Latin America. This reduces, or at best, maintains the economic status quo of the countries because the discourses influence IDB’s organizational practices which in turn contribute to the discourses generally associated with Latin America. The features of an underdeveloped subjectivity (A. Escobar, 1995) are used to develop categories of analysis of the presidents’ communications. From these features, three main categories for analysis emerged: needy, ignorant, passive powerlessness. Examples from the IDB’s activities in Guyana are used to examine the effects of the discursive practices on Latin America. I show that development, as a modern conceptualization to reduce poverty and bring about economic advancement of countries, have not achieved the anticipated level of growth (see also Rostis, 2016; Rostis & Mills, 2007, on the role of the humanitarian organization in Third World countries); actually results in more poverty and underdevelopment; and at the same time influences the thinking and corresponding actions of the people of Latin America.