Development: Which Ideas Now?

Abstract

The practice of development and foreign aid inevitably involves numerous languages and thus requires translation to each the meaning of terms and concepts as all ideas and the words that convey them, are born in particular locations with contextual meanings attached to them. Yet terms are imported—often from West to East, and North to South —without consideration for these contexts. This introductory chapter argues for the need to recover how local actors reinterpret, frame, reconstruct, and reproduce, foreign concepts as they migrate. It also discusses why this is important, and why now. While shifts in thinking occur from time to time, we have been less imaginative in recognizing and overcoming the dominant sources of ideas and concepts that inform our development thinking. This is the reason we focus on the apparently “natural” concepts in Japan and how such concepts travel beyond their place of birth.

1 Sources of Development Ideas

The practice of development and foreign aid inevitably involves numerous languages and thus requires translation in continuous attempts to communicate “the” meaning of terms and concepts. The movement of ideas requires some form of translation because all ideas are born in particular locations with contextual meanings attached to them. In the colonial context, the question of language and power has been addressed intensely. Forced assimilation through language imposition was an important way for the colonizers to exercise their influence (Caprio 2009). Even today, some authors problematize the hegemonic status of English and French in the context of foreign aid. Languages spoken in the Global North are often used when creating guidelines for development and humanitarian sectors without local translations, as a result often excluding certain locals from accessing aid privileges and burdening local implementers with the “impossible task of translating” (Vitantonio 2022).

What is “translation”? The Oxford English Dictionary provides a simple definition: “To convert or render (a word, a work, an author, a language, etc.) into another language; to express or convey the meaning of (a word or text) using equivalent words in a different language.” The editors of this book originally intended to do just that, i.e., to present key Japanese development concepts and investigate how they could be translated into English. We thought this was the sure way toward de-Westernizing development discourse, but we soon realized that the task was not so simple. Many English terms have long been naturalized into our daily conversation. The terms imported from abroad and now being used widely in development discussions include “governance,” “advocacy,” “accountability,” and “empowerment.”¹ In this circumstance, there is not much point in problematizing the dichotomy of foreign and domestic. New meanings are created as terms are imported without any awareness of a need to translate.

Also, we gradually discovered that most development concepts, regardless of their origins, could be understood only in their practice: semantic translation does not convey the full meaning of the term. A “translation” of development-related concepts, in other words, is a dynamic process of meaning transformation through practice, rather than a one-to-one interpretation of word meanings fixed at a particular time. Local actors reinterpret, frame, reconstruct, and reproduce foreign concepts to make them congruent with local contexts (Swangsilp 2018). While theorists and practitioners of development often talk about whether a lesson learned in one country can be applied to another, “replicability” ignores the process of translation, which can transform the very meaning of “lessons.”

The most foundational awareness that the authors came to share was not about the potential or quality of translation; it was the total absence of an effort to translate vernacular concepts back into the mainstream development discourse where many of them originated. Enriching our understanding of concepts is an important prerequisite to enriching the practice of development.

In the history of mainstream development thinking, Indian economist Amartya Sen is known as one of the most influential scholars who re-conceptualized the meaning of development. In his essay “Development: Which Way Now?”, Sen argued forcefully for shifting the analytical emphasis from aggregate economic growth and income to people’s entitlements and capabilities (what people can do or be) (Sen 1983). Sen offered a pivotal breakthrough at a time when the majority of economists assumed an automatic progression from the dominant means of development (economic growth and income) to the ideal ends of development (enhancing the quality of people’s lives). Sen and other proponents of human-oriented development introduced a major shift from emphasizing aggregate GDP to achieving human freedoms and security in societies. Sen won the Nobel Prize in Economics in 1998 as the first awardee from Asia, and the first from India.

While shifts in thinking occur from time to time, we have been less imaginative in recognizing and overcoming the dominant sources of ideas and concepts that inform our development thinking. Even for Sen, much of his empirical observations are based in non-Western societies including China, India, and certain parts of Africa, yet his theoretical reference points had always been in Western literature, such as the political philosophy of Aristotle and John Rawls (Sen 1999).

People of non-Western communities themselves have been accustomed to using concepts that originated (or seem to have originated) in the West to explain and discuss the development trajectory of their own societies. For example, the “developmental state” (Johnson 1982) and the “East Asian miracle” (World Bank 1993) became fashionable concepts to characterize economic development in Asia in the 1980 and 1990s. While there has been some provocation, putting forward “Asian values” as something different from Western-style development (Cauquelin et al. 2014), subsequent development discourse has largely helped to gloss over the unidirectionality of this conceptualization, treating the Asian societies (and the “Rest”) solely as recipients of ideas from the West, with little agency attached to the vernacular concepts.

Inspired by Sen’s seminal article written over 40 years ago, we should now ask “Development: Which Ideas Now?” That is, from where do we obtain ideas about development, and to where do we apply them? From modernization theories in the 1950–60 s to Marxist-inspired critiques in the 1970s, and then on to the search for alternatives that incorporate concerns for gender, the environment, and human well-being in general, the recent tendency is more toward a pluriverse of development (Khotari et al. 2020). Pluriverse development must accompany pluriverse ideas of how to understand and carry out development.

This book initiates this task by focusing on the apparently “natural” concepts that have been used widely in Japan. Many of the concepts we chose to include in this volume have been in use for a long time, such as doboku (civil engineering); some of them are more recent such as kokusai-kōken (international contribution). Certain concepts are exported abroad such as the Trinity, while others are imported such as ōnāshippu (ownership). Regardless of their historical and linguistic origins, we chose them because they characterize Japanese development and aid that can hardly be captured in the English concepts that are prevailing today. What we also found interesting was that there was a “translation” issue even among Japanese language speakers about what exactly these concepts mean. Kaizen, for example, is a Japanese term but its definition varies even among Japanese speakers.

Although we were initially preoccupied with challenging the Western dominance of the development discourse and how to uplift the significance of non-Western ideas, we came to a deeper appreciation of the ambiguity of the concepts that had been naturalized into Japanese society and culture. We realized that the question is not so much of attempting to overcome the West-to-East direction of the movement of ideas, nor a reverse effort to make the West understand “untranslatable” vernacular development concepts. The preoccupation with either importing or exporting development ideas has missed the essential aspect of self-understanding about the very meaning of development. In other words, local language users are not necessarily aware of the meaning of the concepts they use, and this realization came forward thanks to our efforts to translate and discuss them in English.

How can we communicate non-Western concepts to English-speaking readers if we ourselves hardly understand them? Before moving on to the discussion on Japan’s own struggle with remaining Japanese concepts and their repercussions, let me discuss the general absence of interest in these vernacular development concepts.

2 How Did We Leave Behind Our Own Development Ideas?

The field of development studies is full of specialized terminology originating from the West. Empowerment, governance, gender, advocacy, and capacity development are just a few examples of such terms that are widely used. Thanks to the popularization of SDGs as major slogans that have gained recognition beyond the development industry, sustainability and sustainable development are perhaps the most recent concepts to have captured the minds of the general public who want to do “good” for the global community.²

On the other hand, the uncritical popularity of imported ideas marginalizes the significance of vernacular concepts. Interestingly, many of those vernacular concepts continue to survive despite the continuous inflow of foreign concepts. We chose to highlight some of the key vernacular concepts in Japan to offer a more decolonial approach to understanding development and aid practices. What we aim to do is to seek pluriversal development alternatives (Demarica et al. 2023; Acharya 2016; Menon 2022) through the appreciation of vernacular concepts. An important step toward the pluriverse is to reject simple dichotomies. West–East and North–South dichotomies have been convenient but binding frameworks that constrain us from other possible development imaginaries. An additional step is to focus on the movement of those ideas in shaping development practices beyond the location of their birth. “Vernacular concepts” often transcend national and cultural boundaries. Interestingly, seemingly “vernacular concepts” may have originated abroad. The concept of kaizen, for example, pre-existed as a term to mean “improvement,” before another layer of meaning was added to imply an approach to improve production. This new meaning was brought to Japan from the US during the Occupation period after WWII. It was adopted and expanded by Toyota, and is now entering Africa as an important “Japanese” concept in the global development context. The discussion of “vernacular” concepts thus intended to invite their users on a journey of self-discovery by considering the movement of these untranslated terms.

The authors of this book are fully aware of the “ambiguous” dual status of Japan as both former colonial/imperial power and as a non-Western “Other”/the Rest. As Kim (2023) articulates, “locally-driven theorizing efforts in International Development Studies should be weary of the tendency to conflate decentering with diversification―i.e., shifting reference point to East Asia by stressing their difference from traditional donors” (Kim 2023, p. 88), thus simply reproducing the very inequality that the new discourse aimed to overcome. Words shape the world, and those words are always in motion (Gluck and Tsing 2009). By acknowledging where ideas come from and how they change their meaning in different locations, we attempt to recover the value of those concepts that had been with us much longer than Western concepts that are now so dominant and popular.

One solution for respecting the vernacular concept is not to translate it and proffer the original term with explanations. The founding father of development studies in Japan, Nitobe Inazō (1862–1933), faced a similar problem when he wrote his book Bushidō, attempting to explain the spirit of the samurai to the English-speaking world. It is interesting to consider why he did not dare to translate the word “bushidō” as “samurai spirit” or “samurai code of conduct” but chose to use the original term in the title of his book. His own explanation is that “some words have a national timbre so expressive of race characteristics that the best of translators can do them but scant justice, not to say positive injustice and grievance” (Nitobe 1908, p. 4).

Bushidō, like many other local and peculiar concepts and words, must “wear the badge of its singularity on its face” (Nitobe 1908, p. 3). Some of these words and concepts are still circulating widely in Japan. In many cases, even the Japanese themselves may not recognize their historically situated nuances. In development studies, for example, the Japanese term doboku (discussed in Chap. 1)—made up of characters representing earth and wood—is often glossed as “civil engineering” in English. However, the English translation fails to capture its essence, which is centered on the local community’s collaborative efforts rather than the skills and techniques required in doboku works. Yet this aspect of doboku is critical as it has been the backbone of Japan’s infrastructure development cooperation with developing countries.

Japanese development ideas were never forgotten. They have been alive with their own ups and downs depending on the socio-cultural conditions of the time. Yet, they have never attracted the attention that they deserve from development scholars since they seem irrelevant to policy-making, implementing projects, and thus doing development. Perhaps more importantly they are not “fashionable” compared to highlighting popular Western concepts. This aspect should not be underestimated since the easiest way to establish a scholarly conversation with the Western community and to publish in English is to use the concepts the Westerners use.

Another possible reason for the absence of explicit and systematic reexamination of local concepts may be due to the emphasis, particularly in Japan, on praxis rather than ideas that are supposed to underpin such praxis. Praxis of development is constrained by local conditions which tends to go against the scholarly incentive to generalize. We claim that ideas matter in and of themselves as well as in their implication for policy and practice. To make this case, there needs to be a systematic and explicit treatment of “forgotten” concepts that have circulated only in certain regions, hidden in plain sight.

3 Why Japan Matters

Japan provides a powerful context through which questions can be posed about the flow and direction of local concepts. There are three reasons why Japan matters:

First, Japan provides interesting material for discussion that goes beyond the typical dichotomy of dividing up the world such as East and West. Japan’s “success” in adopting the Western development model has allowed it to achieve an unprecedented level of economic growth, making it the first OECD member from the non-Western world. Japan’s potential to look back at its own development trajectory and contribute to shaping other countries’ development provides resources that can be leveraged to position to transcend a simple dichotomy of East/West, North/South. In times when development aid can easily be manipulated to meet ideological ends, the ambiguous (if not neutral) position of Japan should be considered as an asset (see Garon 2017).

Second, Japan became the first major development donor that did not belong to the West. Moreover, Japan is the first non-Western country to achieve the status of a “top donor” in the realm of Official Development Assistance (ODA) which serves as a visible revision to the more conventional treatment of Japan as a mere emulator of the West. Japan also assumed leadership in “East Asian modern” (Prasenjit 2003) initiatives such as effective hygiene programs, mass education, and state-led bureaucracy have been seen as. More recently, disaster recovery has become a key made-in-Japan model that has been applied abroad (Ranghieri and Ishiwatari 2014).

Finally, the wide spectrum of development-related concepts, spanning from ancient times to post-WW2, demonstrates Japan as fertile ground for concepts change as time goes by. The study of these evolving concepts deserves more attention than “shiny” ideas newly arriving from the West. Just as the concept of kaizen originally came from abroad, the translation of concepts from Chinese and Korean has a long history, from ancient times up to the Edo period (Maruyama and Kato 1998). Although some scholarly investigations have emerged to critically examine the hegemonic role of English in the field of development studies (e.g., Erling and Sergeant 2013), systematic studies of the international role of non-English development concepts are yet to be seen.

The concepts and lexicons we examine in this book are listed in some glossaries of development and aid-related handbooks and dictionaries published in Japanese. Such concepts grow and shift their meanings in response to the way they are used. Therefore, it is important to review the context in which those ideas have been translated into action in the field of development.

Japan’s development assistance officially began in 1954, when Japan joined the Colombo Plan, an intergovernmental organization established in 1950 to promote technical assistance to South and Southeast Asia, as a donor. As described in Chap. 7 on the “request-based approach,” Japanese development assistance began on a very different trajectory from that of the West. Most importantly, it was attached to war reparations—an international obligation to compensate for war damages. Unlike the proactive mode of “aid” fueled by the Christian mission to “civilize” underdeveloped pagan countries, Japan’s assistance to other developing countries seemed passive and self-centered- “passive,” because Japan had to portray itself as a humble country that learned a lesson from the consequences of its aggression, now becoming a modest and democratic country concerned with peaceful economic pursuits, and “self-centered” because Japan’s paramount interest immediately after the war was its own economic survival and reconstruction. Economic cooperation had to be linked to domestic economic interests if it was to be supported at all.

Japan strengthened its position as a global donor by joining DAC (the Development Assistance Committee) in the early 1960s. Even today, DAC serves as a central international platform to coordinate aid among US-led Western donors, and also defines what counts as ODA (Official Development Assistance). Gaining membership in DAC was a critical turning point. DAC also became a battlefield where Japan had to defend and justify its aid approaches, which often conflicted with those conducted by Western donors. As Japan’s success and economic growth became obvious, so did the Western expectation for Japan to contribute more in aid. Yet Japan continued to emphasize loans as opposed to grant aid, without clearly identifying its own philosophy behind what development objectives should be pursued, and this attracted criticism from the Western community coming from the tradition of Christian “giving” (see Chap. 12).

By the 1980s, Japan had become the largest development donor in the world, and it was around this time that Japan began to face international pressures and expectations as the top donor (Shimomura 2022). There was a need to justify how it conducted its development assistance, particularly in comparison to Western aid donors. Ideas such as the “request-based principle” (Chap. 7) and “self-help support” (Chap. 8) were products of such circumstances. Academic conceptualizations of developmental experience also took place, resulting in the establishment of graduate programs on international development at major universities (Kim et al. 2023). Japan no longer had the luxury to give priority to its own development without offering a visible “contribution” to the world (see Chap. 10). While international circumstances, especially US policies, were always a key factor in Japan’s navigation, it had to claim its own “philosophy” of development and aid. Our attempt is by no means to claim that Japanese concepts are unique. To the contrary, we believe that similar attempts can be made in almost all countries around the world, a movement which we wish to initiate with this publication. Japan as a method may be a powerful step toward this move.

4 Overview of the Book

This book considers development concepts and lexicons that emerged and evolved in Japan, and that had penetrating repercussions on both domestic and international scenes. We organize them according to the socio-political role given to them at specific times into the following four groupings: (1) Concepts and lexicons pertaining to technical assistance and how it should be conducted (doboku, kaizen, genba-shugi); (2) ideas related to self-identity and the perception of others (Asianism, hito-zukuri, naihatsuteki-hatten, kokusai-kōken); (3) concepts and norms that characterize Japanese aid strategies (yōsei-shugi, ownership, jijo doryoku); and (4) Lexicons of practices attracting international criticism from the West and emulated later by China (kaihatu-yunyu, yen loans, the trinity approach).

Simultaneously, contexts give “lives” to these ideas. Because all of these concepts are “living things” that change their meaning, we encourage readers to keep in mind their roles in particular places at particular times in the history of development and aid. Some ideas such as naihatuteki-hatten (endogenous development) emerged out of self-reflection, while others such as kokusai-kōken (international contribution) became popular to meet global attention and expectations. Some ideas such as kaizen are adopted by foreign countries, giving them different meanings in those foreign contexts. Figure 1 provides a schematic overview of the socio-political groupings of chapters, in accordance with the time period each idea first appeared in policy vocabulary.

Fig. 1

Source Authors

Chapter organization.

Our focus is not merely on the semantics of words but more on the different expectations and meanings attached to developmental terms which can invite international misunderstanding and conflict. To be clear, the list is by no means a glorification of alternative concepts from Japan. These concepts have their own problems, contradictions, and practical ramifications. Yet bringing these to the discussion of development ideas enlarges the debate, toward the pluriverse, through its recognition of new sources of ideas.

The chapters are organized as follows.

Part 1: Norms of Technical Assistance

Chapter 1, Doboku (土木), discusses the evolution of ideas pertaining to infrastructure. Doboku is typically translated as “civil engineering.” But, as we shall see, it was initially a practice describing collective action in building temples and other local commons’ infrastructure by offering labor. The concept faded as development transformed from on-site physical labor to more technical and knowledge-based activities.

Chapter 2 focuses on Kaizen (カイゼン). Perhaps the most popular concept in this book, kaizen has been adopted and practiced in businesses around the globe. Kaizen is also rare in crossing over public–private sector boundaries. The Japanese word “kaizen” is commonly translated into English as “continuous improvement” or simply “improvement.” However, this literal translation obscures important connotations that are difficult to translate. This chapter discusses the meaning of kaizen and why this seemingly simple term is challenging to comprehend not only for non-native speakers but also for Japanese readers. This chapter also demonstrates the point that appreciating a concept in the local language does not necessarily mean that one really understands it.

Chapter 3, Genba-shugi (現場主義). Hands-on, field-based, grounded, bottom-up—these adjectives come close but do not quite capture the sum of their interactions. Genba-shugi has become a key principle of the Japanese approach to development projects that prioritize the on-site local context. It has gained the status of an aid policy of JICA for some time. Yet, what genba-shigu means still remains ambiguous. This chapter uncovers the practice of genba-shugi which has been portrayed as a Japanese approach to problem-solving.

Part II: Reflecting on Self and Others

Chapter 4 re-assesses one of the more notorious Japanese concepts in international relations: Asianism (アジア主義). This chapter traces the historical roots, development, and diffusion of Asianism from its origins in Meiji Japan as a vision of Asian solidarity in the face of Western encroachment to its current form as a driver of regional economic cooperation. By doing so, it demonstrates that Asianism in Japan can be understood, depending on the context, as Asian regionalism. Rather than a static concept rooted in wartime conceptualizations of Japan as the leader of Asia, Asianism is a term that has shifted over time, along both lexical and semantic axes. By delineating such transformations, the chapter illuminates the ways in which the concept has influenced Japan’s foreign policy stance and international cooperation development agenda.

Chapter 5, Hitozukuri (人づくり), is yet another term that cannot be translated in a straightforward manner. “Human resources development” is the most common translation but it misses the context to which this concept is relevant. Hitozukuri has been a key slogan of the Japanese aid agency along with kuni-zukuri (nation-building). One basic idea of Japanese development cooperation was that people needed to be “built” for the purpose of nation-building. The chapter explores the origin and political implications of this concept.

Chapter 6, Endogenous Development (内発的発展), discusses a concept that evolved as a fusion of Western and Japanese ideas about the ownership of development trajectories. By focusing on the contributions of US-trained sociologist Tsurumi Kazuko, the chapter presents the features of an endogenous development theory rooted in the Asian development experience. It then discusses how the theory might be applied in the contemporary development context and concludes by making a case for Tsurumi’s naihatsuteki hattenron in international development research and practice.

Part III: Japanese Aid Strategies

Chapter 7, Yōsei-Shugi (要請主義), examines a less prominent concept in Japanese aid to consider what it might reveal about the Japanese style of development cooperation. This principle simply states that Japan offers aid based on requests from the recipient country, but gained the status of “aid principle” in the late 1980s particularly in contrast to Western donor approaches that give emphasis on norms of the aid providers such as human rights and freedom. Although the request-based principle no longer serves as a “selling point” for the Japanese government today, a similar approach is now adopted by emerging donors such as Thailand and China. By tracing the evolution of aid to the war reparation period in the 1950s, this paper explores how the principle was institutionalized as a mechanism to form a “Japanese style” of aid provision.

Chapter 8 critically re-examines and attempts to refine the definition of Jijodoryoku (自助努力) as a policy principle, by considering its evolution within Japanese and in international ODA policy. Jijo doryoku, which translates directly to “self-help effort,” is a concept that is utilized to encapsulate the principle that ODA should be utilized for supporting recipient countries to help themselves. The chapter argues that it is better to conceptualize the term as a highly general and abstract term denoting the social-psychological state (i.e., the “spirit”) of a recipient, which could be utilized to stipulate and evaluate general conditions for ODA recipients.

Chapter 9 examines Japan’s efforts to lead international development discourse through an idiosyncratic definition of Ōnāshippu (オーナーシップ) that emphasizes recipients’ responsibility, such as self-help and agency. This chapter argues that the Japanese-style “ōnāshippu” (ownership) is a product created in conjunction with Japan’s ambition to enhance its presence as a major donor in the aid community since the 1990s. Instead of using direct translations of self-help and autonomy, it deliberately applied the English loanword ownership because it was instrumental for Japan to take an initiative in the international aid community at that time. While the concept of ownership was widely accepted, the particularities of Japan’s usage of the term were largely misunderstood. The term continued to be used by the international community as a vestige of Japan’s attempts to lead.

Chapter 10, Kokusai-koken (国際貢献), became popular only since the early 1990s. It is literally translated as “international contribution.” This concept is often used when the Japanese respond to an international situation calling for their assistance with certain monetary or human sacrifices. Appearing most often at the intersection of peacebuilding and development cooperation, this concept sheds light on an interesting gap between self-awareness and the actual expectations of the international community.

Part IV: International Criticism and Emulation

Chapter 11 highlights Kaihatsu-yunyū (開発輸入), yet another challenging concept to translate. Officially translated as the “development and import scheme,” it combines resource development with economic cooperation. The origins of the scheme lie in Japan’s lack of raw materials for postwar economic growth and the private sector’s interest in expanding their projects through the postwar reparation scheme. The idea and practice were then adopted by China much later when it became a major donor. This concept raises questions about the economic and social conditions that allow such “transfer” to happen.

Chapter 12 discusses Yen Loans (円借款), which were subjected to perennial criticism from the United States and European countries. Against the Western norm that development assistance is a form of charity by the rich countries for the sake of poor countries, Japan provided an alternative model not well understood by Western counterparts. While reconsidering yen loans from the position of Japan and recipient countries, the chapter questions the nature of heterodoxy in development discourse.

Chapter 13 discusses the Trinity (三位一体), a concept of combining trade, aid, and investment to achieve a win–win relationship between the donors and recipients of development cooperation. This concept has now become popular in China. The chapter delves into the interpretation of the trinity in development practice in Japan and China and how it has changed over time. Though attracting little attention in Japan in the 1980s when it was first used as an economic cooperation-related concept, the trinity became a focus of debate with the rise of China as an emerging aid donor. In times when other non-Western development donors are rising, the discussion of the transferability of development concepts will provide readers with theoretical tools designed to pursue a global perspective on development through a local lens.

The concluding chapter reiterates the significance of this book along the organizing concepts of time and space, and explores the potential of “Japan as Method.” By questioning the absence of decolonial debates and the “uniqueness myth,” this final chapter argues for pluriverse knowledge production.

As we approached the completion of the book, we recalled the question posed by Sen 40 years ago: “Development which way now?” Our answer is that development should go in many directions against the homogenizing forces. We claim that pluralizing the sources of development ideas should be the first step toward this direction. This book is an effort to propose and begin to respond to the question: “Development: which ideas now?”.

Notes

• 1. These concepts, originated in English, are localized in the phonetic katakana script, used for the transcription of foreign-language words as loan words.

• 2. A survey conducted in 2022 on awareness of SDGs (Sustainable Development Goals) in the US, Japan, and China demonstrated the Japanese and Chinese awareness of SDGs far exceeded that of North America (ASMARQ 2022).