Conflicting challenges in development, Edited by P Styger, S Meyer & A Saayman

Abstract

'Conflicting challenges in sustainable development' might have been a more apt and useful title for this collection of papers presented at the most recent biennial conference of the Development Society of Southern Africa, in September 1996. Many of the papers deal with the conflicts of trying to develop sustainably in the face of economic, political, social and other constraints. The collection is a pot-pourri of contemporary quandaries and paradoxes in development. The subject matter is examined through the multihued lenses of various social science disciplines, ranging from statistically analysed empirical economics to cultural studies. The papers are written at many different levels, from studious academic exploratory excursions to the platitudinous rants of soapbox preachers. While many of the chapters are interesting and insightful, the messy and multivaried nature of the collection may obscure this benefit for the less persistent reader.