Decolonization has become a popular discourse in academia recently and there are many debates on what it could mean within various disciplines as well as more broadly across academia itself. The field of international development has seen sustained gestures towards decolonization for several years in theory and practice, but hegemonic notions of development continue to dominate. Development is a contested set of ideas and practices that are under critique in and outside of academia, yet the reproduction of colonial power structures and Eurocentric logics continues whereby the realities of the global majority are determined by few powerful institutions and a global elite. To decolonize development's material and discursive powers, scholars have argued for decolonizing development education towards one that is ideologically and epistemologically different from dominant narratives of development. I add to these conversations and posit that decolonized ideologies and epistemologies have to be accompanied by decolonized pedagogies and considerations of decolonization of institutions of higher education. I discuss the institutional and critical pedagogical dilemmas and challenges that exist, since epistemological, methodological, and pedagogical decolonizations are influenced by institutional politics of higher education that are simultaneously local and global. The paper engages with the concept of critical hope in the pursuit of social justice to explore possibilities of decolonizing development praxis and offers suggestions on possible pathways forward.
AndreottiV. (2016) “The Educational Challenges of Imagining the World Differently.”Canadian Journal of Development Studies37(1), 101–12.
4.
AndreottiV., SteinS., SutherlandA., PashbyK., SusaR, AmslerS. (2018) Mobilising Different Conversations about Global Justice in Education: Toward Alternative Futures in Uncertain Times,Policy & Practice: A Development Education Review, 26, 9–41.
5.
Apffel-MarglinF., MarglinS. (1996). Decolonizing Knowledge: From Development to Dialogue.Clarendon: Oxford University Press.
6.
AsherK. (2013) Latin American decolonial thought, or making the subaltern speak.Geography Compass7(12), 832–842.
7.
AsherK., WainwrightJ. (2018) After Post-Development: On Capitalism, Difference, and Representation.Antipode51(1), 25–44.
8.
BaudI., BasileE., KontinenT., and von ItterS2019. Building Development Studies for the New Millennium.Switzerland: Palgrave Macmillan.
9.
BhambraG. (2014) Postcolonial and decolonial dialogues,Postcolonial Studies17(2), 115–121
10.
BhambraG. K., GebrialD., NişancιoğluK. (2018). Decolonising the University.Pluto PressLondon.
11.
BlautJ. (1993). The Colonizer's Model of the World: Geographical Diffusionism and Eurocentric History.New York, NY: Guilford Press.
12.
CésaireA. (1972). Discourse on Colonialism.New York: Monthly Review Press.
13.
ChakrabartyD. (2007). Provincializing Europe: Post-colonial Thought and Historical Difference, Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press.
14.
ChantilukeR, KwobaB., NkopoA. (2018). Rhodes Must Fall: The Struggle to Decolonise the Racist Heart of Empire.London: Zed Books.
15.
ChattertonP., HodkinsonS., PickerillJ (2010) Beyond scholar activism: Making strategic interventions inside and outside the neoliberal universityACME: An International Journal for Critical Geographies9(2), 245–275.
16.
ConnellR. (2007). Southern Theory: The Global Dynamics of Knowledge in Social Science.Cambridge: Polity Press.
17.
CrushJ. (1995). The Power of Development.London: Routledge.
18.
CupplesJ., GrosfoguelR. (2019). Unsettling Eurocentrism in the Westernized University.Abingdon: Routledge.
19.
EscobarA. (1995). Encountering Development: The Making and Unmaking of the Third World.Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press.
20.
EscobarA. (2016) Thinking-feeling with the earth: Territorial struggles and the ontological dimension of the epistemologies of the South,AIBR Revista de Antropología Iberoamericana, 11(1), 11–32.
21.
EssonJ., NoxoloP., BaxterR., DaleyP., ByronM. (2017) The 2017 RGS-IBG Chair's Theme: Decolonising Geographical Knowledges, or Reproducing Coloniality?Area49(3), 384–88.
22.
EstevaG., BabonesS., BabcickyP. (2013). The Future of Development.Bristol: Bristol University Press.
23.
FanonF. (1952/2008). Black Skin, White Masks, Richard Philcox (translation), New York, NY: Grove Press.
24.
FanonF. (1963). The Wretched of the Earth.New York: Grove Press.
25.
FergusonJ. (1994). The Anti-Politics Machine: “Development,” Depoliticization and Bureaucratic Power in Lesotho.Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
26.
FrankA. G. (1966). The Development of Underdevelopment.New York: Monthly Review Press.
27.
FreireP. (1970). Pedagogy of the Oppressed.New York: Herder and Herder.
28.
FreireP. (1994). Pedagogy of Hope: Reliving Pedagogy of the Oppressed.New York: Continuum.
GirouxH. A. (2010) Rethinking Education as the Practice of Freedom: Paulo Freire and the Promise of Critical Pedagogy.Policy Futures in Education, 8(6), 715–721.
31.
HarawayD. (1988) Situated Knowledges: The Science Question in Feminism and the Privilege of Partial Perspective.Feminist Studies14(3), 575–99.
32.
HeletaS. (2016) Decolonisation of Higher Education: Dismantling Epistemic Violence and Eurocentrism in South Africa.Transformation in Higher Education1(1), 1–8.
33.
HochschildA. (1998). King Leopold's Ghost: A Story of Greed, Terror, and Heroism in Colonial Africa.Boston, MA: Houghton Mifflin.
34.
hooksB. (1994). Teaching To Transgress.New York: Routledge.
35.
hooksB. (2003). Teaching Community: A Pedagogy of Hope.Abingdon: Routledge.
36.
KapoorI. (2015) What ‘Drives’ Capitalist Development?Human Geography, 8(3), 66–78.
KothariU. (2006) An agenda for thinking about ‘race’ in development.Progress in development studies, 6(1), 9–23.
39.
LabouchèreH. (1899) The Brown Man's Burden,Truth (London); reprinted in Literary Digest 18, February 25, 1899.
40.
LangdonJ. (2013) Decolonising development studies: Reflections on critical pedagogies in action,Canadian Journal of Development Studies34(3), 384–399.
41.
LastA. (2018) Internationalisation and the Academy: sharing across boundaries? In BhambraG.K., NisanciogluK., GebrialD. (eds) Decolonising the University: Context and Practice.London: Pluto.
42.
LongW. (2018) Decolonising Higher Education: Postcolonial Theory and the Invisible Hand of Student Politics.New Agenda: South African Journal of Social and Economic Policy (69), 20–25.
43.
LugonesM. (2010) Toward a decolonial feminism.Hypatia, 25(4), 742–759.
MbembeA. (2016) “Decolonizing the University: New Directions.”Arts and Humanities in Higher Education15(1), 29–45.
46.
McClintockA. (1995). Imperial Leather: Race, Gender, and Sexuality in the Colonial Contest, New York: Routledge.
47.
MignoloW. (2007) Delinking: The Rhetoric of modernity, the logic of coloniality and the grammar of de-coloniality,Cultural Studies, 21:2, March: 449–514.
48.
MohantyC. T. (1984) Under Western Eyes: Feminist Scholarship and Colonial Discourses.Boundary2(12/13), 333–358.
49.
MohantyC. T. (2003). Feminism without borders: Decolonizing theory, practicing solidarity.Durham: Duke University Press.
50.
MossP. (2002). Feminist Geography in Practice: Research and Methods.Oxford: Blackwell.
51.
NagarR., AliF. (2003) Collaboration across borders: Moving beyond positionality.Singapore Journal of Tropical Geography, 24(3), 356–372.
52.
NandyA. (1983). The Intimate Enemy: Loss and Recovery of Self under Colonialism, Delhi: Oxford University Press.
53.
NoxoloP. (2017) Decolonial theory in a time of the re-colonisation of UK research,Transactions of the Institute of British Geographers, 42(3), 342–344.
54.
QuijanoA. (2000) Coloniality of Power and Eurocentrism in Latin America.International Sociology, 15(2), 215–232.
55.
RadcliffeS. A. (2017) Decolonising geographical knowledges.Transactions of the Institute of British Geographers, 42(3), 329–333.
56.
RaghuramP., MadgeC. (2006) Towards a Method for Postcolonial Development Geography? Possibilities and Challenges.Singapore Journal of Tropical Geography, 27, 270–288.
57.
RahnemaM., BawtreeV. (1997). The Post-Development Reader.London: Zed Books.
58.
RamamurthyP., TambeA. (2017) Preface: Decolonial and Postcolonial Feminist Approaches: A Dialogue,Feminist Studies, 43(3), 503–511.
59.
Rivera CusicanquiS. (2012) Ch'ixinakax utxiwa: A Reflection on the Practices and Discourses of Decolonization,The South Atlantic Quarterly, 111(1), 95–109.
60.
RodneyW. (1972). How Europe Underdeveloped Africa.Washington, D.C.: Howard University Press.
61.
RutazibwaO. (2018). On babies and bathwater: decolonizing International Development Studies. In de JongS., IcazaR., RutazibwaO. U. (Eds.), Decolonization and Feminisms in Global Teaching and Learning (pp. 158–180). London: Routledge.
62.
SabaratnamM. (2017). Decolonising Intervention: International Statebuilding in Mozambique.London: Rowman & Littlefield International.
63.
SachsW. (1992). The Development Dictionary: A Guide to Knowledge as Power.London: Zed Books.
64.
SaidE. (1979). Orientalism, New York: Vintage.
65.
SantosB. (2007). Another knowledge is possible: Beyond Northern epistemologies.London: Verso.
66.
SantosB. (2014). Epistemologies of the South: Justice against epistemicide.Boulder: Paradigm Publishers.
67.
SchönebergJ. (2019) Imagining Postcolonial-Devel-opment Studies: Reflections on Positionalities and Research Practices, in BaudI. (eds.), Building Development Studies for the New Millennium, EADI Global Development Series, Netherlands: Springer.
68.
SensoyO., DiAngeloR. (2012). Is everyone really equal? An introduction to key concepts in social justice education.New York: Teachers College Press.
69.
SimonD., CarrE. R. (2014) Introduction: engaging critically from theory to policy and implementation,Third World Quarterly. Routledge, 35(3), 505–506.
70.
SimonD., PalmerH., RiiseJ., SmitW., and ValenciaS. (2018). The challenges of transdisciplinary knowledge production: from unilocal to comparative research.Environment and Urbanization, 30(2), 481–500.
71.
SpiegelS., GrayH., BompaniB., BardoshK., and SmithJ. (2017). Decolonising online development studies? Emancipatory aspirations and critical reflections–a case study.Third World Quarterly38(2), 270–290.
72.
SpivakG. (1988) Can the Subaltern Speak? in Cary Nelson and Lawrence Grossberg,Marxism and the Interpretation of Culture, pp 271–316. Chicago: University of Illinois Press.
73.
SpivakG. (1999). A Critique of Postcolonial Reason: Towards a History of the Vanishing Present.Harvard University Press: Cambridge, MA.
74.
SultanaF. (2007) Reflexivity, Positionality and Participatory Ethics: Negotiating Fieldwork Dilemmas in International Research.ACME: An International Journal for Critical Geographies, 6(3), 374–385.
75.
SultanaF. (2014) Doing development as a critical development scholar,Third World Quarterly, 35(3), 516–519.
76.
SultanaF. (2018). The false equivalence of academic freedom and free speech: Defending academic integrity in the age of white supremacy, colonial nostalgia, and anti-intellectualism.ACME: An International Journal for Critical Geographies17(2), 228–257.
77.
Thiong'oN. (1986). Decolonising the Mind.Harare: Zimbabwe Publishing House
78.
TlostanovaM., MignoloM. (2012). Learning to Unlearn: Decolonial Reflections from Eurasia and the Americas.Columbus, OH: The Ohio State University Press.
79.
TuckE. (2009) Suspending Damage: A Letter to Communities.Harvard Educational Review79(3), 409–428.
80.
TuckE., and YangK. W. (2012) Decolonization is not a metaphor.Decolonization: Indigeneity, Education & Society, 1(1), 1–40.
81.
TuckE., YangK. W. (2018). Toward What Justice?New York, NY: Routledge.
82.
Tuhiwai SmithL. (1999). Decolonizing Methodologies: Research and Indigenous Peoples.London: Zed Books.
83.
Tuhiwai SmithL., TuckE., YangW. K. (2019). Indigenous and decolonizing studies in education: Mapping the long view.London and New York: Routledge.
84.
Underhill-SemY. (2017). Academic work as radical practice: getting in, creating a space, not giving up.Geographical Research55(3), 332–337.
85.
WalshC., MignoloW. (2018). On Decoloniality.Durham, NC: Duke University Press.
