Aidnography

Hello all, It really pays off to be par t of a vibrant net work of development blogging friends and c olleagues! Wh ether on Madonna's visit to Malawi, the use of co nsultant's in development pro jects, a fascinating report on Colombia's ' University of Resistance' or a recap on participatory video-many friends really are at the frontiers of different debates! There are also some critical reflections on latest reports published by ID S and other re search institutes as well as links to a scientific confer ence on the Fukushima nuclear disaster and Richard Florida's admission that the 'creative class' may not have that significant of an impact after all-you will get the development relation when you scroll down...Finally, anthropologist graduate Sarah Kend zior reflects on the challen ging post - PhD transition and a political scientists explains why his artic le on blogging was in the journal publication pipeline for almost two years. Enjoy! Developme...

Hello all, The post-holiday week link review features some unspectacular, but ver y readable development related policy-issues from inequality to the conflict in the Central African Republic, new donors ' between 'useful id iots' and development norm changers, microfinance , arms trade , why oil revenues are unlikel y to be on Nepal's agenda any ti me soon and some academic reflections on participatory phot o interviews in evaluations . 'Ethno mining ' is probably my word of the week a s Ethnography Matters starts a month of great posts on ethnograph y , big data and positivist challenges. Over in Academia, a publ isher is learning about the Streisand-effect and there's a lso an interesting post on how and why Gender Studies are still confronted with 'dangerous laughter'. A quick note on a new category on the blog, Student advice , which is featuring some older, but still relevant, content around doing a PhD, entering 'the field' of deve...

I recently came across an interview in Wired magazine from mid-2012 with MIT Media Lab ‘guru’ Joi Ito on Resiliency, Risk, and a Good Compass: Tools for the Coming Chaos . He concluded the interview with his ‘9 or so ’ principles to ‘ survive in this chaotic, unpredictable system where planning is almost impossible ’ (which sounds a l ot like some of the current day complex or ‘wicked ’ development scenarios that are discussed): Resilience instead of strength, which means you want to yield and allow failure and you bounce back instead of trying to resist failure. You pull instead of push. That means you pull the resources from the network as you need them, as opposed to centrally stocking them and controlling them . You want to take risk instead of focusing on safety. You want to focus on the system instead of objects . You want to have good compasses not maps . You want to work on practice instead of theory. Because sometimes you don’t why it works, but what is important...

Hello all, This week's review is quite an eclectic mix - including cats and sex (in the blog-appropriate form of ethnographic research on Ugandan Internet memes and a 'sex strike' of Indonesian women for conflict resolution). But there's more for the forthc oming long holiday weekend! New publications, how drones impact development work, the media's non-engagement with the conflict in Mali, what people think is the most effective tool to curb corruption, BRICS and the new global capi talist imperialism, lazy aid journal ism around UK's Red Nose campaign as well as ref lections on the precious work-life balance. I already mentioned that chicke ns and g oats are the cats of the Ugandan Internet and last not le ast, some reflections on how 'post -publication' (peer) review can work th rough social media . And there's more! Happy holidays! New on aidnography Paved with Good Intentions–Canada’s development NGOs from idealism to imperialism (book review...