From decolonisation to locally-led development: repoliticising the agenda

February 2024

GADN Members’ Meeting

In recent years, the initial bold ambition to ‘decolonise development’ has slowly morphed into calls for ‘locally-led development’. However, these are two very different concepts that are increasingly being used synonymously.

This GADN Members’ Meeting provided an opportunity to explore what locally-led development and decolonisation mean in practice with speakers Dr. Kamna Patel, UCL and Dr. Lata Narayanaswamy, University of Leeds. We examined why locally-led development is gaining traction politically and discussed why decolonial approaches are still needed in the international development sector.

Speakers:

  • Dr. Lata Narayanaswamy: Associate Professor in the Politics of Global Development at the University of Leeds, Trustee at the Gender and Development Network (GADN)

  • Dr. Kamna Patel: Associate Professor at Development Planning Unit at UCL

  • Sophie Efange: Head of Policy, Gender and Development Network (GADN)

Lata’s slides can be found here, Kamna’s slides here and Sophie’s slides here

GADN resources that were mentioned during the panel:

Meetings events webinarsGADN CoordinatorFeminist advocacy, Anti-racism & decolonisation