Defying Displacement: Grassroots Resistance and the Critique of Development

by Anthony Oliver-Smith

The uprooting and displacement of people has long been among the hardships associated with development and modernity. Indeed, the circulation of commodities, currency, and labor in modern society necessitates both social and spatial mobility. However, the displacement and resettlement of millions of people each year by large-scale infrastructural projects raises serious questions about the democratic character of the development process. Although designed to spur economic growth, many of these projects leave local people struggling against serious impoverishment and gross violations of human rights. Working from a political-ecological perspective, Anthony Oliver-Smith offers the first book to document the fight against involuntary displacement and resettlement being waged by people and communities around the world. Increasingly over the last twenty-five years, the voices of people at the grass roots are being heard. People from many societies and cultures are taking action against development-forced displacement and resettlement (DFDR) and articulating alternatives. Taking the promise of democracy seriously, they are fighting not only for their place in the world, but also for their place at the negotiating table, where decisions affecting their well-being are made.

Genres: Anthropology

303 pages, Paperback

First published August 1, 2010

Reviews

[Alex Knipp · Rating 5 out of 5]

Oliver-Smith's work is at once foundational and challenging to our understandings of the myriad displacements done in the names of development and progress. I absolutely loved digging into the rest of this theoretical framework as well as some case studies. Favorite quotes below:
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“The idea of progress is part of Western cultural fabric, which provides a justification for colonialism and other forms of economic expansion [exploitation].”

“Those that question the dominant models of development do not reject the need to alleviate the grinding poverty that afflicts roughly have the globe, but neither do they embrace the consumerism and accumulation that characterize “modern” societies, particularly at the expense of the social, cultural, and environmental integrity that these elements undermine.”

[Nick · Rating 4 out of 5]

This ethnographic examination serves as an important counterweight to studies that simply equate "local support" with polyarchic democratic participation (e.g. Transnational Civil Society and the World Bank: Investigating Civil Society S Potential to Democratize Global Governance).