Tied affectedness? Grassroots resistance and the World Bank

Abstract

ABSTRACTThis paper argues that there can be no category of ‘affected people’ without a decision-making process that triggers affectedness in the first place. In that sense, affectedness is a category that is by default, although not irreversibly, ‘tied’ to a certain institutional context. In this paper, I examine such ‘tied’ quality of affectedness by focusing on the benefits and dangers of the affectedness paradigm to grassroots organisations in the context of World Bank projects. Whilst in principle the category of ‘affected people’ seems to empower the grassroots, this article argues that the danger of institutional co-optation in this context is also high. The World Bank and its borrowers have full discretion to include, but also to exclude, people from this category. Therefore, the voices of grassroots organisations relying on this paradigm can be instrumentalised and distorted. This article suggests that mediation can help to ‘untie’ affectedness from the top-down institutional discourse, in order to create space for a more balanced dialogue between resistance groups and decision-makers.