International development is now a major global activity and the focus of the rapidly growing academic discipline of development studies. The Encyclopedia of International Development provides definitions and discussions of the key concepts, controversies and actors associated with international development for a readership of development workers, teachers and students. With 600 entries, ranging in length from shorter factual studies to more in-depth essays, a comprehensive system of cross references and a full index, it is the most definitive guide to international development yet published. Development is more than a simple increase in a country's wealth and living conditions. It also implies increasing people's choices and freedoms; it is change that is inclusive and empowering. Development theory and practice has important applications to questions of economic growth, trade, governance, education, healthcare, gender rights and environmental protection, and it involves issues such as international aid, peacekeeping, famine relief and strategies against HIV/AIDS. The Encyclopedia treats these topics and many more, and provides critical analyses of important actors within development such as the United Nations and World Bank, non-governmental organizations and corporations. Contributors to this volume reflect the multidisciplinary and international nature of the subject. They come from social science disciplines such as economics, international studies, political science and anthropology, and from specialities such as medicine. This Encyclopedia provides crucial information for universities, students and professional organizations involved with international development, and those interested in related topics such as international studies or other studies of social and economic change today.

International Development is now a major global activity and the focus of the rapidly growing academic discipline of development studies. The "Encyclopedia of International Development "provides definitions and discussions of the key concepts, controversies and actors associated with international development for a readership of development workers, teachers and students.
With 600 entries, ranging in length from shorter factual studies to more in-depth essays, a comprehensive system of cross references and a full index, it is the most definitive guide to international development yet published.
Development is more than a simple increase in a country's wealth and living conditions. It also implies increasing people's choices and freedoms; it is change that is inclusive and empowering. Development theory and practice has important applications to questions of economic growth, trade, governance, education, healthcare, gender rights and environmental protection, and it involves issues such as international aid, peacekeeping, famine relief, and strategies against HIV/AIDS. The "Encyclopedia" ""treats these topics and many more, and provides critical analyses of important actors within development such as the United Nations and World Bank, non-governmental organizations and corporations.
Contributors to this volume reflect the multidisciplinary and international nature of the subject. They come from social science disciplines such as economics, international studies, political science and anthropology, and from specialties such as medicine.
This "Encyclopedia "provides crucial information for universities, students and professional organizations involved with internationaldevelopment, and those interested in related topics such as international studies or other studies of social and economic change today.

In this far-reaching examination of environmental problems and politics in northern Thailand, Tim Forsyth and Andrew Walker analyze deforestation, water supply, soil erosion, use of agrochemicals, and biodiversity in order to challenge popularly held notions of environmental crisis. They argue that such crises have been used to support political objectives of state expansion and control in the uplands. They have also been used to justify the alternative directions advocated by an array of NGOs. In official and alternative discourses of economic development, the peoples living in Thailand's hill country are typically cast as either guardians or destroyers of forest resources, often depending on their ethnicity. Political and historical factors have created a simplistic, misleading, and often scientifically inaccurate environmental narrative: Hmong farmers, for example, are thought to exhibit environmentally destructive practices, whereas the Karen are seen as linked to and protective of their ancestral home. Forsyth and Walker reveal a much more complex relationship of hill farmers to the land, to other ethnic groups, and to the state. They conclude that current explanations fail to address the real causes of environmental problems and unnecessarily restrict the livelihoods of local people. The authors' critical assessment of simplistic environmental narratives, as well as their suggestions for finding solutions, will be valuable in international policy discussions about environmental issues in rapidly developing countries. Moreover, their redefinition of northern Thailand's environmental problems, and their analysis of how political influences have reinforced inappropriate policies, demonstrate new ways of analyzing how environmental science and knowledge are important arenas for political control. This book makes valuable contributions to Thai studies and more generally to the fields of environmental science, ecology, geography, anthropology, and political science, as well as to policy making and resource management in the developing world.

The mountainous borderlands of socialist China, Vietnam, and Laos are home to some 70 million people, representing an astonishing array of ethnic diversity. How are these peoples fashioning livelihoods now that their homeland is open to economic investment and political change? Moving Mountains presents the work of anthropologists, geographers, and political economists with first-hand experience in the Southeast Asian Massif. Together, they show that the parallel experiences of ethnic minorities in these three socialist regimes offer a unique opportunity to explore the intersection of ethnicity, livelihood, and state-society relations. Case studies on groups such as the Drung in Yunnan, the Khmu in Laos, and the Hmong in Vietnam document the experiences of such minorities under socialist regimes and how their lives are changing under more open political and economic conditions. Although scholars have typically represented highland people as marginalized and powerless, Moving Mountains argues that they draw on culture and ethnicity to indigenize modernity and maintain their livelihoods. This unprecedented glimpse into a poorly understood region shows that development initiatives must be built on strong knowledge of local cultures in order to have lasting effect.