South:South Development

• Credit value: 30 credits at Level 7
• Convenor: Jasmine Gideon
• Assessment: a 3000-word critical annotated bibliography (30%) and a 5000-word essay (70%)

All too often, development cooperation is understood as a one-way street that leads from the so-called 'Northern' donors to the so-called 'Southern' recipients. While China's involvement in Africa has been the object of greater attention from practitioners and academics in recent years, and has thus helped break this one-sided perspective, the role played by other Southern actors remains largely ignored.

This module will fill this gap by critically examining a wide range of Southern actors, their contribution to South-South development and how their involvement affects development ideas and practice. It will consider South-South development cooperation at all levels, including the role of Southern states (e.g. China, Brazil, India, Iran, Cuba) and inter-governmental organisations (regional development banks and organisations), but also of lesser-known actors such as Southern non-governmental organisations, illegal syndicates, entrepreneurs and migrants.

Indicative module content

• Overview of South: South development
• State development: China, Brazil, India, South Africa
• Intergovernmental actors and regional development banks
• State development and pariah states: Cuba, North Korea, Iran, Venezuela
• Southern capital(ists)/private firms
• Southern NGOS
• Migrants' remittances
• Illegal syndicates and development
• Insurgency and development
• Religious organisations in development

On successful completion of this module you will be expected to be able to:

• understand who the main Southern development actors are
• critically evaluate the roles of, and interactions between, Southern development actors
• demonstrate a complex understanding of the dynamics of South-South development cooperation
  
• explain how South-South development cooperation affects development of ideas and practices and global power dynamics.