This article engages with Monique Deveaux’s book Poverty, Solidarity, and Poor-Led Social Movements. Deveaux argues that philosophers writing on poverty and global justice should be more attentive to what poor people themselves think and do in response to poverty. I support Deveaux’s general orientation but reflect on some challenges that need to be considered and negotiated to achieve Deveaux’s goals. The article begins by complicating some of the distinctions Deveaux makes, especially the distinction between organisations which act on behalf of (...) the poor and those which are led by poor people. To further complicate this distinction, the article explores debates on representation that highlight some of the complexities that arise when privileged actors seek to act in solidarity with poor-led movements. Finally, the article invites Deveaux to further elaborate on the question of the epistemic value of listening to poor people’s accounts. (shrink)

Being at Home stimulates careful conversation about some of the most pressing issues facing higher education institutions in South Africa today - race, transformation, and institutional culture. While there are many reasons to be despondent about the current state of affairs in the South African tertiary sector, this book is an invitation for the reader to see these problems as opportunities for rethinking the very idea of what it is to be a university in contemporary South Africa. It is also, (...) more generally, an invitation to think about what it is that the intellectual project should ultimately be about, and to question certain prevalent trends that affect - or, perhaps, infect - the current global academic system. The volume will be of interest to all those who are concerned about the state of the contemporary university, both in South Africa and beyond. [Subject: African Studies, Higher Education]. (shrink)

It is clear from these and other definitions that development, no matter how it is conceived, involves change. However, it is also clear that not all change constitutes development. A particular change could be part of a process of development, but could also be part of several other processes, such as those of alteration, modification, deformation, adaptation, regression, degradation and the like. Thus it is necessary to differentiate between changes that can be said to be part of a process of (...) development, and those that cannot. In an attempt to make such a distinction and in line with the above-mentioned definitions of development one could say that changes that are part of development are changes that bring about increased likeness to some more advanced or better state of being. (shrink)