3 readings I like No. 02
Dear all,
Welcome to this week’s newsletter!
I posted my regular Links & Contents I Liked last Friday, the 392nd curated #globaldev collection. This week’s mid-week readings are:
Nairobi’s airports – windows on Kenya’s colonial past and top-down planning
Gordon Pirie for The Conversation provides an overview of his paper on, perhaps not entirely surprising, the lack of participatory planning during British colonial rule:
“In the late colonial period, the airport planning process was not very consultative. Officials in various strands of government were in the driving seat. Settler voices were heard indirectly, but not those of Africans or the Kenyan Asian population.”
It is very hard to end poverty in Africa because of white people, and black people
”Many in the development sector also have a few other fears, e.g. the belief that ordinary poor Africans like me might, in reality, be fraudsters — and that a genuine effort to end global poverty must instead be led by some otherwise more legit people, i.e. whites — hence the need to keep people like us at bay.
The challenge with the latter isn’t just that it has ensured that nearly all global antipoverty interventions in Africa are top-bottom (or trickle-down), and largely short-lived, but also, it has meant that in most of Africa’s rural poor communities, there is simply nothing that is happening to end poverty.”
Simple, powerful words from Anthony Kalulu from Uganda.
'Degree inflation': How the four-year degree became required
”In other words, the people currently doing the work don’t have degrees, but as they retire or leave their positions, their replacements will be expected to.This creates a system where companies struggle to fill jobs and incur unnecessary costs, all the while leaving experienced, willing workers out in the cold.”
Lots to unpack what “neoliberalism” has meant to the education sector, but I want to take this BBC piece as an opportunity to remind you that I am always happy to discuss higher education, second MAs or PhD ideas with readers-after all, that is part of my day job :)
Happy reading & keep in touch!
Tobias
P.S.: The pandas upgraded their snow game :) !
