Singapore Journal of Tropical Geography 28 (2007) 205 – 218 © 2007 The Author Journal compilation © 2007 Department of Geography, National University of Singapore and Blackwell Publishing Asia Pty Ltd doi:10.1111/j.1467-9493.2007.00291.x Beyond antidevelopment: Discourses, convergences, practices David Simon Centre for Developing Areas Research, Department of Geography, Royal Holloway, University of London, Surrey, UK Correspondence: David Simon (email: d.simon@rhul.ac.uk) Formulations of anti- and postdevelopment are held by some critics to be more appropriate and sensitive successors to development, predicated on the assumption that it is essential to escape and transcend the discredited nature of ‘the development project’. Yet, many such proposals remain unsubstantiated or have not provided significant gains beyond the now very animated theoretical debates. This paper seeks to transcend some of the associated divisions that are hampering progress towards the largely shared goals. A process of progressive convergence in alternative, critical and postdevelopment thinking is advocated and this paper outlines some promising directions being taken by such discursive and practical endeavours. Keywords: development, antidevelopment, postdevelopment, critical development theory, politi- cal ecology Introduction Kama huna kitu kabisa huwezi kupata haki [If you have nothing at all, you will not get your rights] (old male villager, Meru region, Tanzania, cited in Masaiganah, 2002: 82). Badlao se Bachao [Save us from transformation] Vikas vinaash hai [Development is destruction] (slogans of people’s movements in India, cited in Jain, 2002: 25). At least three complementary and mutually legitimizing strands of critique of conven- tional development can be distinguished. The first constitutes comments and slogans, like those quoted above, from people who have been excluded from, or adversely affected by, development projects and programmes – the so-called victims of development – and who have been central to campaigns for an end to the destruction of nature, indigenous soci- eties and cultures, and numerous livelihoods in the name of development. Second are empirical studies of development failure, demonstrating that particular projects or broader programmes for national, regional or local development failed to make the antici- pated positive impact but, instead, turned out to be inappropriate and often unproductive white elephants, and/or incurred substantial human, social, environmental and eco- nomic costs (e.g. Black, 1999). The third strand comprises intellectual debates around the so-called development impasse in the late 1980s–early 1990s, the challenge posed by the rise of poststructural theoretical perspectives and the resultant series of oft-cited ‘antidevelopment’ books such as Wolfgang Sachs’ (1992) Development Dictionary ; James Ferguson’s (1994) study of bureaucratization and depoliticization of development in Lesotho, The Anti-Politics Machine ; Jonathan Crush’s (1995) Power of Development ; and Arturo Escobar’s (1995) Encountering Development. These titles are now also held to be among the canons of ‘post- development’ – indicative, perhaps, of the lack of clear distinction between these two approaches. While some chapters in Crush (1995) fit the bill, Majid Rahnema and