Culture and Sustainable Development in Developing Countries Research Papers (original) (raw)

The new museum movement in India has been born, in recent years, out of the realization that museums are epiphenomena of the museumization of the world. This article speaks of the new dimensions added to the movement for harnessing the museums to the revitalization of the living museums of community habitats. The initiatives undertaken by the author over several decades have been directed towards using this approach for linking livelihood sustenance strategies of Development Departments of the Government with indigenous cultural management traditions. Attention has been redirected from mere display of objects to regeneration of ideas; from communities visiting museums to museums visiting communities; from a fragmented and compartmentalized approach for a passive presentation of vanished life ways and knowledge systems, to an integrated and dynamic approach of using exhibition as an action instrument for recycling, rebuilding and reinventing knowledge categories. The dominant objective has been to save the museums from becoming irrelevant as charnel houses of cultural detritus and transform them into extension and outreach centers for forward looking, life nurturing community ventures.

This study examines dance as a cultural phenomenon that mirrored the
strategies of Tunisian cultural politics over history, since the rise of the Bourguiba and the Ben Ali regimes until the post-revolution phase.
The ultimate purpose of this work is providing a tentative picture of the Tunisian dance sector: a realm in which old and new discourses coexisted and were often reversed, embodying the endless process of redefinition of cultural heritage that translates a country’s realities into socio-political values.

Active citizenship and participatory community-development approaches have evolved partly in response to perceived aid-dependency among rural communities. In Solomon Islands these methods have met with mixed success. This article reflects on the frustration often felt by local and international development workers when working with rural communities. It questions some of the assumptions that shape the way in which development workers and programmes understand the types of community which make up Solomon Islands.

- by John Cox
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- Anthropology, Comparative Politics, Social Anthropology, Development Studies

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Myanmar is currently at an historical, yet fragile transitional stage. Since a new government, headed by previous military leader Thein Sein, was formed in 2011, the country has indeed embarked in a sincerely welcomed process of political opening-up to the external world, and has positively resumed its dialogue with the international community. This led to the suspension of most international sanctions towards Myanmar, which, together with some timid reforms, are at the base of the first significant achievements in the field of economic growth and socio-political development. These reforms promise to transform the country into an economically prosperous, democratic state with greater civic participation, and unleash its great economic potential. To keep the momentum, all resources are now being used to support the country's development process.
But Myanmar has a further asset that nobody has properly valued nor utilised yet: its cultural heritage. Cultural heritage has indeed been recognised as an increasingly important aspect in a country’s economy and society, because of its role encompassing all levels and aspects of the social life, and the economic benefits deriving from its management. Following a three-dimension approach, this paper analyses how Myanmar’s cultural heritage properties and their effective management could represent a useful resource towards the achievement of the country’s development goals in the areas of economic growth, social and political unity, and environmental conservation and sustainability. The analysis also considers the importance of the international engagement in the field of heritage conservation and promotion, and the potential benefits of a EU’s direct involvement in cultural promotion and preservation projects in the country.

Cities have played historically central role in the formation, evolution and transmission of the culture. They have been a birthplace of norms and values, symbols, arts, and also embraced the vast number of material as well as human resources of the civilizations. Cities are defined by communication, exchange, association. They were founded around culture, that’s why they are centres of civilization, so they are not a peripheral external that can be related to cities, they are at the core of what cities are about.
The study of the proposed future developments in the cities across the world has shown that the relation between the culture and the city form is changing. The cities are aiming to retain their culture but the physical manifestation of it has changed, where identity has become the driving factor. There are two major ways which have been identified that the future development in the cities is taking up.
Culture as commodity where the cultural identity is being used to attract people or even the tourists. Here, the development plays a major role in influencing and transforming the local culture by introducing the new cultural elements in the form of expats.
Culture as a resource for sustainable development. Here, the take on the development is genuine towards retaining the culture and hence culture moulds the development.

An exploration of the potential of museums to become cultural catalysts within society, addressing the most pressing issues of our day - those related to human sustainability on the planet. The paper, which grew out of a keynote address to the Alberta Museums Association, explores environmental, social and economic dimensions of sustainability, as well as the potential of museums to evolve their functions to meet humanity's emerging needs.

Development seen from a more holistic perspective looks beyond the expansion of material means and considers the enrichment of people's lives. The arts are an indispensable asset in taking a comprehensive approach toward the improvement of lives. Incorporating aspects of international trade, education, sustainability, gender, mental health and social inclusion, The Creative Wealth of Nations demonstrates the diverse impact of applying the arts in development to promote meaningful economic and social progress. Patrick Kabanda explores a counterintuitive and largely invisible creative economy: whilst many artists struggle to make ends meet, the arts can also be a promising engine for economic growth. If nations can fully engage their creative wealth manifested in the arts, they are likely to reap major monetary and nonmonetary benefits from their cultural sector. Drawing from his own experience of the support music provided growing up amidst political and economic turmoil in Uganda, Kabanda shows us the benefits of an arts-inclusive approach to development in Africa, and beyond.

Self-reliance was a cornerstone of Ujamaa socialism -the ideology of Tanzania from 1967 till mid-1980s. In the post-Cold-War time the socialist ideology has actually been abandoned, together with the really valuable concept of self-reliance. At present, Tanzania is crucially dependent on foreign aid. We argue that aid can play a positive part for the country, but only if it will promote her self-development which, in its turn, is possible only if the nation strives to become self-reliant. However, in contemporary Tanzania the culture of self-reliance has almost disappeared since national ideology has virtually changed, and many people rely on foreign aid and national government, not on their own hard work. At the same time, the union of foreign donors and corrupted national bureaucracy results for Tanzania in aid without development that, as in the case of mosquito bed nets aid, cannot promote self-reliance and, hence, socio-economic progress. The paper is based on fieldwork conducted under the papergiver's guidance in two Tanzania's regions -Dar es Salaam (three urban municipalities, 67 filled out questionnaires and 18 structured interviews) and Morogoro (two rural districts, 58 questionnaires and 12 structured interviews).

- by Dmitri Bondarenko
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- African Studies, Government, Postcolonial Studies, Political Science

After WWII, development became a major global pursuit, and culture played a key role in ideas of how to nurture its occurrence. This chapter scrutinizes postwar, largely uncritical, development theory—focusing on the way in which culture... more

- by Tim MacNeill
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- Cultural Studies, Political Economy, International Development, Cultural Theory

With the 2015 deadline for the MDGs fast approaching there is an argument for more human-centered approaches that address entrenched concerns such as social exclusion, marginalization and inequality. With this comes the increasing recognition of culture as a major tool in contextualizing development –particularly the contributions and potential of cultural and creative industries to promote local community development. However, in spite the global debate on creative economy, the Common African Position on a post-2015 sustainable development agenda still makes no mention of the role of culture in ensuring localized ownership of future development agendas. This paper considers the relevance of culture to Africa’s Post-2015 development strategy and develops a critical analysis of the strategic usefulness of the Nairobi Plan of Action on Cultural and Creative industries in guiding local and regional understanding of the ways cultural policies can work to support social and economic development.

- by Christiaan De Beukelaer
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- Development Studies, Postcolonial Studies, Culture, Creative Industries

Self-reliance was a cornerstone of Ujamaa socialism – the ideology of Tanzania from 1967 till the mid-1980s. In the post-Cold-War period socialist ideology was actually abandoned, together with the really valuable concept of self-reliance. As most African countries, Tanzania is crucially dependent on foreign aid. We argue that aid can play a positive part for Tanzania and countries like it, but only if it promotes their self-development which, in its turn, is possible only if a nation is or strives to become self-reliant. However, in contemporary Tanzania the culture of self-reliance has almost disappeared since national ideology has changed, and many people rely on foreign aid and national government, not on their own hard work. At the same time, the union of foreign donors and corrupt national bureaucracy results in Tanzania in aid without development that, as in the case of aid for mosquito bed nets, cannot promote self-reliance and, hence, socio-economic progress.
Keywords: Aid, civil society, development, self-reliance, state, Tanzania

- by Dmitri Bondarenko
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- African Studies, Government, Postcolonial Studies, Political Science

A tribute is given to the renowned poet administrator Sri Ashok Vajpeyi, who conceived and founded the Bharat Bhavan and many other cultural institutions in Bhopal and Delhi. He gave moment and definition to Indian culture in India and abroad. As he crosses the 80th year of his creative bounty, a few glimpses of his career are offered to demonstrate how the apparent gulf between culture and development can be bridged.

The application of monocentric models of residential location to the analysi'; of metropolitan areas with more than one center of economic activity, produces a disto~'tt::d view of the spatiai distribution of urban variables such as land values, housing prices, etc. This distortion result~ from the fact that monocentric models tend to underestimate the values of these variables in areas lying between the centers, and yield wider residential areas toward the outskirts of the city. In this paper, a mod,:l of household location is developed, which attempts to correct, this distortion by simultaneously considering the urban centers during the rcsideotial location process.

The increase of education level in the country is a priority task for the Tanzanian state. However, it may seem that completion of this task may cause political problems as far as since the colonial period Christians have generally been more educated than Muslims and obtained better access to high positions in the sphere of administration. If Muslims become as educated as Christians, will not it lead to a severe struggle for power between the two communities? Our analysis based on field research reveals that most likely, this will not be the case: neither the present-day situation nor the tendencies we trace point at high probability of the negative scenario for the future. The increase of education level of both Christians and Muslims will rather contribute to further toleration of the Christian-Muslim relations in the country.

- by Dmitri Bondarenko
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- Religion, Christianity, Sociology of Religion, African Studies

This is an article where the author has advocated for promotion of alternative institution for development and promotion of traditional Indian culture and cultural activities including Makar sankranti and Pongol considering their utility... more

Desde su surgimiento, la educación para el desarrollo sostenible (EDS) ha suscitado críticas por parte de algunos sectores vinculados con el campo de la educación ambiental (EA) en América Latina, quienes argumentan que no hay aportes novedosos de este enfoque para la EA. A través de la exploración de la relación entre educación, cambio cultural y sostenibilidad, en este artículo se argumenta que la EDS sí tiene aspectos novedosos que podrían impactar de manera positiva en el desarrollo conceptual y en la práctica de la EA en Latinoamérica. Específicamente se considera que, aunque la EA en Latinoamérica ha abordado aspectos del ámbito sociocultural ignorados por la EA de otras regiones, la manera en la que la EDS considera la cultura es novedosa, y podría generar nuevas formas de plantear los problemas ambientales y de trabajar hacia un futuro más sostenible.

- by Kinsey Katchka
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- Cultural Policy, Museum Studies, Cultural Heritage, Heritage Studies

Raising the standard of education in the country is a priority task for the Tanzanian government. However, it seems that completion of this task may cause political problems insofar as, since the colonial period, Christians have generally been more educated than Muslims and obtained better access to high administrative positions. If Muslims become as educated as Christians, will it not lead to a severe struggle for power between the two communities? Our analysis based on field research reveals that this is not very likely to be the case: neither the present-day situation nor the tendencies we trace point to a high probability that this negative scenario will materialise. A rise in the standard of education level of both Christians and Muslims will rather contribute to increase in tolerance in Christian-Muslim relations in the country.

- by Dmitri Bondarenko
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- Christianity, Sociology of Religion, African Studies, Anthropology

The article is based on evidence from the field collected in 2003 and 2005. Though the overall level of Muslims' tolerance towards Christians and vice versa is quite similar among men and women of both religions, it does not go without saying that different factors shape their attitudes to the same degree and that their attitudes turn out the same in various social situations. The relative importance of factors sup-posedly influencing men and women's interreligious attitudes is investigated. The dis-plays of those attitudes by people of different sexes in the major contexts of interrelig-ious interaction – local-personal and socio-political, are discussed. The results of the research may be summarized the way as follows: The factors of greater overall impor-tance are origin, education, and presence or absence of another religion adherents among relatives. The significance of such factors as age and financial situation is lower. Local (from one of autochthonous Tanzanian peoples) origin and education in-fluence men and women generally in the same direction and to a similar degree. Non-local origin, age, financial situation, and having or not having relatives of another re-ligion differentiate men and women's attitude to the other religion this or that way. The very adherence to Islam or Christianity, marital status, presence or lack of children are not independent factors of the Christian-Muslim mutual tolerance at all.

- by Dmitri Bondarenko
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- Religion, Christianity, Sociology of Religion, African Studies