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Renovating dependency and self-reliance for participatory sustainable development

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Abstract

Dependency stands for manygrievances and is generally considered asymptom of oppression. An opposing concept,offered as the preferred state, isself-reliance. Dependency and self-reliance arekey concepts in sustainable developmentprograms that feature participatory approaches.Some of the ways in which development projectsemploy the concepts of dependency andself-reliance, however, are troubling.Dependency and self-reliance in two programsfor participatory sustainable development areexamined, one in Canada and the other in NewZealand. Frameworks for dependency and self-reliance aredrawn from social psychology and philosophy toexamine problematic aspects associated with theconcepts. Analysis produced a proposal foruse of the term situatedinterdependence as a way to cast the outcomesof participatory sustainable development moreprecisely. The location of the cases (Canadaand New Zealand) centers the discussion withina context of industrialized agriculture, butalso points to issues pertinent to developingcountries.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Agricultural Education and Studies, Iowa State University, 217 Curtiss Hall, Ames, IA, 50011, USA

    Nancy Grudens-Schuck

  2. Collaborative Learning for Environmental Management, Landcare Research, Lincoln, New Zealand

    Will Allen & Margaret Kilvington

  3. Tuskegee University, Tuskegee, Alabama, USA

    Tasha M. Hargrove

Authors
  1. Nancy Grudens-Schuck
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  2. Will Allen
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  3. Tasha M. Hargrove
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  4. Margaret Kilvington
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Correspondence to Nancy Grudens-Schuck.

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Grudens-Schuck, N., Allen, W., Hargrove, T.M. et al. Renovating dependency and self-reliance for participatory sustainable development. Agriculture and Human Values 20, 53–64 (2003). https://doi.org/10.1023/A:1022412623083

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