What difference does it make to add "culture into development thinking and projects on the ground? This collection of essays based on recent field research into specific local projects and development programs explores the multiple and contested ways in which culture comes into development paradigms and practice. Culture has gone from being a "background" factor in development paradigms and practice. Culture has gone from being a "background" factor in development thinking to becoming a new buzzword, seen to be central in the dynamics associated with development processes. Yet the evaluation of practical and theoretical of this cultural shift in development has often been done abstractly.
By contrast, this text offers a grounded engagement with culture as it enters into development paradigms, institutions and local dynamics. With case studies ranging from Africa through to Andean Latin America, the chapters provide a detailed empirical discussion of the possibilities of, and limits to, "adding culture" into development. The collection's strength lies in combining discussion of projects in the global south, with material about the Mormons and high tech industries in the United States, and Japanese consumption of Bolivian music to broaden our understanding of cultural issues in development.
Key scholars have combined broader theoretical discussions on the neo-liberal context for development's cultural turn and the concept of social capital with thorough, critical and original evaluations of specific development processes and projects. The chapters thus bring the culture and development debate up-to-date by using the latest theoretical approaches to socioeconomic change to critically evaluate current initiatives.