The original critical guide to key concepts in development studies from some of the world's most eminent critical development scholars and practitioners. Each essay in this now classic collection examines one key development concept, from the 'environment' to 'needs' and 'progress' to 'production'. Each concept is reviewed from a historical and anthropological point of view, with particular bias and intellectual flaws being highlighted. Overall, the authors argue that we must bid farewell to the whole idea of Eurocentric development in order to liberate people's minds in both North and South and to mobilize for bold responses to the environmental and ethical challenges now confronting humanity. The result is an indispensable resource for scholars, practitioners, movements and students of development which invites us to recognize the tinted glasses we put on whenever we participate in the development discourse.

The original critical guide to key concepts in development studies from some of the world's most eminent critical development scholars and practitioners. Each essay in this now classic collection examines one key development concept, from the ‘environment’ to ‘needs’ and ‘progress’ to ‘production’. Each concept is reviewed from a historical and anthropological point of view, with particular bias and intellectual flaws being highlighted. Overall, the authors argue that we must bid farewell to the whole idea of Eurocentric development in order to liberate people’s minds in both North and South and to mobilize for bold responses to the environmental and ethical challenges now confronting humanity. The result is an indispensable resource for scholars, practitioners, movements and students of development which invites us to recognize the tinted glasses we put on whenever we participate in the development discourse.

In his cultural analysis of the motor car in Germany, Wolfgang Sachs starts from the assumption that the automobile is more than a means of transportation and that its history cannot be understood merely as a triumphant march of technological innovation. Instead, Sachs examines the history of the automobile from the late 1880s until today for evidence on the nature of dreams and desires embedded in modern culture. Written in a lively style and illustrated by a wealth of cartoons, advertisements, newspaper stories, and propaganda, this book explores the nature of Germany's love affair with the automobile. A "history of our desires" for speed, wealth, violence, glamour, progress, and power--as refracted through images of the automobile--it is at once fascinating and provocative.
Sachs recounts the development of the automobile industry and the impact on German society of the marketing and promotion of the motor car. As cars became more affordable and more common after World War II, advertisers fanned the competition for status, refining their techniques as ownership became ever more widespread.
Sachs concludes by demonstrating that the triumphal procession of private motorization has in fact become an intrusion. The grand dreams once attached to the automobile have aged. Sachs appeals for the cultivation of new dreams born of the futility of the old ones, dreams of "a society liberated from progress," in which location, distance, and speed are reconceived in more appropriately humane dimensions.

All effects of human action will inevitably be played out within our planet's limits; any hope of infinity is an illusion. And yet, as Wolfgang Sachs warned almost twenty years ago, environmental concerns have been assimilated into the rhetoric, dynamics and power structures of development. This classic collection of trenchant and elegant explorations addresses the crisis of the Western world's relations with nature and social justice. Examining the notions of efficiency, speed, globalization and development, Sachs shows that sustainability, truly conceived, is incompatible with the worldwide rule of economism. Planet Dialectics reveals that the Western development model is fundamentally at odds with both the quest for justice among the world's people and the aspiration to reconcile humanity and nature.