Call for Papers: APISA-CLACSO-CODESRIA,The Feasibility of
Democratic Developmental States in the South, 11/06
APISA - CLACSO - CODESRIA
SOUTH-SOUTH COMPARATIVE RESEARCH SEMINARS
THE FEASIBILITY OF DEMOCRATIC DEVELOPMENTAL STATES IN
THE SOUTH
DATES: 27 - 30 November, 2006
VENUE: Kampala, Uganda.
CALL FOR APPLICATIONS
1. INTRODUCTION: THE NEED FOR A SOUTHERN REFLECTION ON THE DEMOCRATIC DEVELOPMENTAL
STATE
The Asian Political and International Studies
Association (APISA), the Latin American Council of
Social Sciences (CLACSO) and the Council for the
Development of Social Science Research in Africa
(CODESRIA) are pleased to announce the
Africa/Asia/Latin America scholarly collaborative
initiative encompassing joint research, training,
publishing and dissemination activities by researchers
drawn from across the global South, and to call for
applications for participation in the South-South
comparative research seminars they are organising
within the framework of the initiative. The theme that
has been selected for the fourth seminar in the series
is: The Feasibility of the Democratic Developmental
State in the South. The seminar will take place in
Kampala, Uganda, from 27 - 30 November, 2006. It is
designed to generate a collective reflection among
Southern intellectuals on a theme which is enjoying a
revival against the backdrop of the crises of
neo-liberalism. During the 1970s, in the wake
especially of the transformations which the countries
of East Asia were undergoing, a major discussion took
place on the notion and experience of the developmental
state. The debates covered a variety of concerns: the
nature of the accumulation of capital that was going
on, the implication of the export-orientation strategy
that underpinned it, the feasibility of the
developmental state that was emerging, its basic
institutional attributes, the nature of the
relationship between the state and business, the
sustainability of the developmental state over the
long-run, its social discontents and environmental
impacts, its democratic deficits, the geo-political and
strategic security contexts that triggered it in some
regions of the South, its replicability in other
regions of the developing world, the failure of
developmentalism to take-root in some countries, and
the local and global policy environments that shaped
it.
During the 1980s, however, the developmental state
debate went into recession as the neo-liberal market
ideology gathered steam and sustained ideological
attacks were launched both against the state as an
institution and the state-led model of accumulation
that predominated in the post-1945 period. During the
two and half decades that market-led economic reforms
prevailed and neo-liberalism enjoyed an ideological and
a policy hegemony, all suggestions about an effective
role for the state in the development process were
deemed passé and illegitimate. Indeed, some even went
so far as to proclaim the end of history on the basis
of the alleged triumph of market capitalism over state
socialism, and with it the death of development. It
took a costly realisation that two and half decades of
structural adjustment had failed signally to deliver
the results that had been expected for reluctant
efforts to begin to be made in the second half of the
1990s to recognise that the state had an inevitable and
unavoidable role in development. Moreover, the type of
state that was called for and the role which it needed
to play could not simply be limited to a night watchman
function of providing an enabling environment - that
was nothing more than another way of re-casting the
ideology of the minimalist state of the 1980s - but,
more crucially, a state that is developmentalist in its
ideological moorings, institutional chatacteristics and
operational practices. It was in this context that the
debate on the developmental state was revived, aided
and popularised by spectacular episodes of market
failures in East Asia and Latin America that took a
huge toll that is comparable to the equally huge social
costs that structural adjustment exacted across Africa,
Central America and the Caribbeans, and South Asia
The renewed debate on the developmental state is,
however, taking place in a vastly changed political
context in which pressures for democracy, whether
popular or liberal, are in evidence globally and across
the South. Also, all over the world, citizens are
forging new claims of entitlement on the state and
social policy has come to occupy a central place in
politics. It is this context that, in part, accounts
for the push to address the feasibility of bringing the
state back more centrally into the developmental
process as the leading agency in the developmental
process whilst simultaneously building the
socio-political foundations on which it is anchored on
democratic principles and inclusive social policies
that are capable of producing a democratic
developmentalism. Participants in the Kampala session
of the South-South Comparative Research Seminars are
invited to reflect on the feasibility of the democratic
developmental state in Africa, Asia and Latin America,
doing so by revisiting the broad contours of the old
developmental state debate whilst simultaneously
addressing on-going efforts aimed at tackling the
social and democratic deficits in the earlier
experiments in developmentalism that occurred in East
Asia by treating the notion of development as going
beyond economic growth to include human development,
social justice and environmental sustainability, as
well as focusing on issues of regime types,
embededness, and representativity. Other concerns that
would merit being addressed include the possibility for
the emergence or sustenance of a democratic
developmental state in the South in the light of the
widening national, South-South, and North-South
inequalities that characterise the contemporary world
system, the asymmetries that are built into the
international development architecture such as it is
presently structured, the constraints posed by the
pre-dominantly neo-liberal tone and tenor of
contemporary globalisation, and the implications of the
hegemonic position of international finance capital
driven by a speculative logic over manufacturing
capital.
2. OBJECTIVES:
Within the ambit of the APISA-CLACSO-CODESRIA
collaboration, a series of activities and programmes
has been scheduled for implementation over the period
to the end of 2007, among them three annual comparative
research seminars. The seminars are designed to serve
as a research forum for the generation of fresh and
original comparative insights on the diverse problems
and challenges facing the countries of the South. In
doing so, it is hoped also that the seminars will
contribute to the revival and consolidation of
cross-regional networking among Southern scholars,
foster a scholarly culture of Southern
cross-referencing, and contribute to a type of
theory-building that is more closely attuned to the
shared historical contexts and experiences of the
countries and peoples of the South. The seminars will
be rotated among the three continents where the lead
collaborating institutions are located, namely, Africa,
Asia and Latin America. This way, participants in the
seminars who will also be drawn from all three
continents will be exposed to the socio-historical
contexts of other regions of the South as an input that
will help to broaden their analytical perspectives and
improve the overall quality of their scientific
engagements.
The underlying objective of the comparative research
seminars is to offer participants an opportunity to
transcend the limitations of received wisdom emanating
from structures and processes of knowledge production
and dissemination that are characterised by various
degrees and layers of inequality. In doing so, it is
hoped to both motivate and equip participants in the
seminar with the critical theoretical and
methodological perspectives that might be appropriate
for gaining a full understanding of the specific
situation of countries and peoples located outside the
core of the international system such as it is
presently structured. The main premise for this effort
is the glaring inadequacy of the theories and
methodologies developed in the North, and crystallised
in the mainstream social sciences, to provide the
required instruments for the attainment of a sound and
holistic understanding of the problems confronting -
and, in many cases, overwhelming the countries of the
South. Through the seminars, it is hoped to be able to
mobilise scholars from across the South to reflect on
the alternatives that are available for overcoming the
present situation. This way, the seminars will
contribute to the promotion of a better knowledge and
understanding of the theories and methodological
approaches developed in different regions of the South
as alternatives to the dominant, Northern-biased
paradigms that have shaped the social sciences. It is
also expected that participants will become acquainted
with the local intellectual environment in the regions
where different sessions of the seminar are hosted, and
strengthen their comparative research capacities in the
process. In sum, the seminars are structured to serve
as a unique forum for enhancing a deeper understanding
among Southern scholars of the history, politics,
economy and culture of the countries of Africa, Asia
and Latin America, and offer an opportunity to
participants to develop long-lasting collaborative
relationships with their counterparts from other
Southern countries.
3. ELIGIBILITY FOR PARTICIPATION:
Scholars resident in countries of the South and who are
pursuing active academic careers are eligible to apply
to participate in the seminars. Each applicant should
have an advanced university education and an
established track record of research and publishing in
any of the disciplines of the social sciences and
humanities. Selection for participation will be on the
basis of a competitive process. All together, 12 people
will be selected for participation in the institute on
the basis of four each from Africa, Asia and Latin
America. The full participation costs of the selected
laureates will be covered, including their travel costs
(economy return air tickets), accommodation and
subsistence.
4. COORDINATION:
Each seminar will be convened and coordinated by an
experienced Southern scholar recognised for the
versatility of his/her knowledge, acknowledged for
his/her skills in applying the comparative methodology,
and known either for the depth of work s/he has done in
different regions of the South or for his/her capacity
to draw on experiences from across the South in his/her
writings. The convenor/coordinator will be responsible
for establishing the comparative framework for the
seminar for which s/he is responsible and will work
with each participant to determine his or her primary
area of focus. S/he will also undertake the task of
synthesising results produced by the researchers into
one major publication that will be designed to serve as
a major statement on the theme of the seminar.
5. THE 2006 SEMINAR SCHEDULED FOR KAMPALA, UGANDA:
For the 2006 session of the South-South comparative
research seminar, it has been decided by APISA, CLACSO
and CODESRIA to host it in Kampala, Uganda. CODESRIA
will assume overall responsibility within the
tri-continental partnership for the session. The local
institutional host in Uganda that will be working
closely with CODESRIA in managing the seminar is the
Centre for Basic Research. The seminar will run from 27
to 30 November, 2006. It is a requirement that
prospective laureates should have a demonstrable
working knowledge of the English language. APISA,
CLACSO and CODESRIA will work together with the local
host to facilitate the procurement of entry visas to
Uganda for the prospective participants whose
applications are successful. At the end of the seminar,
each participant will be expected to produce a
publishable article which will be considered for
inclusion in the book of proceedings that will be
issued.
6. APPLICATION REQUIREMENTS:
Every researcher wishing to be considered for selection
as one of the 12 scholars to be invited to participate
in the any of the comparative research seminars
organised within the framework of the
APISA-CLACSO-CODESRIA tri-continental partnership is
required to submit an application that will comprise
the following key items of documentation:
-
An outline research proposal, written in English, on
the subject on which s/he would like to work. The topic
selected must be related to the theme of the seminar
and should have a demonstrable comparative potential.
Proposals should not exceed 10 pages in length and
should have a clearly defined problematic which can be
followed through further research and culminate in a
publishable scientific paper;
-
A covering letter, of one-page, which should
indicate the motivation of the prospective researcher
for wanting to participate in the seminar and
explaining how they envisage that they and their
institution will benefit from the programme;
-
An updated Curriculum Vitae complete with the names
of the professional and personal references of the
researcher, the scientific discipline(s) in which s/he
is working, the nationality of the applicant, a list of
recent publications, and a summary of the on-going
research activities in which the applicant is involved;
-
A photocopy of the highest university degree
obtained by the applicant and of the relevant pages of
his/her international passport containing relevant
identity data;
7. APPLICATION PROCEDURES AND DEADLINE
As the comparative research seminar will involve the
participation of researchers from Africa, Asia and
Latin America, it has been decided that applicants
resident in Africa should submit their applications to
CODESRIA, those resident in Asia to APISA and those
resident in Latin America to CLACSO. The full contact
details for APISA, CLACSO AND CODESRIA are reproduced
below for the attention of all prospective applicants.
The deadline for the receipt of applications is 31
October, 2006. Applications found to be incomplete or
which arrive after the deadline will not be taken into
consideration.
An independent Selection Committee charged with
screening all applications received will meet shortly
after the deadline for the receipt of applications.
Successful applicants will be notified immediately the
Selection Committee completes it work. Notification of
results will be dome by e-mail, fax and post. The
results of the selection exercise will also be
published on the websites of APISA, CLACSO and
CODESRIA.
v Latin American and Caribbean applicants should send
their applications to:
CLACSO,
(2006 South-South Comparative Research Seminars)
Callao 875, 3º (1023) Buenos Aires, ARGENTINA
Tel: (54 11) 4811-6588 / 4814-2301; Fax: (54 11) 4812-845
E-mail: programa_sur-sur@campus.clacso.edu.ar
Website: www.clacso.org
Asian applicants should send their applications to:
APISA,
(2006 South-South Comparative Research Seminars)
Strategic Studies and International Relations Program
Universiti Kebangsaan Malaysia, 43600 Bangi, MALAYSIA
Tel: 603- 89213647; Fax: 603-89213332
E-Mail: secretariat@apisanet.org
Website: www.apisainfo.org
African applicants should send their applications to:
CODESRIA,
(2006 South-South Comparative Research Seminars),
BP 3304, CP 18524, Dakar, SENEGAL
Tel: (221) 825 9822: Fax: (221) 824 1289
E-mail: south.institute@codesria.sn
Website: http://www.codesria.org
Page Editor: Ali B. Ali-Dinar, Ph.D.