Development 2.0: A Critical Discourse Analysis of Peer-to-Peer Aid
Date
2018-09-10
Authors
Duke, Haley
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Abstract
Foreign aid and development projects, in their initial conception, were generally executed through large-scale state and NGO interventions aimed at eradicating poverty in the developing world. More recently however, development has become an interactive experience, transcending international borders and mobilizing personal relationships between individuals in the Global North and South. Within this new landscape of development – what I call “Development 2.0” – World Vision and Kiva.org have, in their own right, gained international recognition for the approaches they take to alleviate poverty and the numbers of people they have reached. World Vision, perhaps the foremost organization for child sponsorship, encourages individuals to donate to a child in need to provide them with the basic necessities of life. Kiva.org, in contrast, departs from the practice of donating through gifts to a focus on “empowering” individuals through small loans, under the presumption that this provides them with the tools and resources they need to lift themselves out of poverty. Through a critical discourse analysis, this paper builds on current literature to highlight the similarities and differences between World Vision and Kiva.org. This research shows how these two organizations, although manifestations of the same phenomena of peer-to-peer aid, mobilize two different representations of the “Other.” This, in turn, hails two distinct donor subjects: one who conceives of foreign aid as charity and a gift and another who conceives of it as a loan and in terms of market relations. By merging online linguistic evidence with contemporary literature, this paper contributes to research on development in the field of anthropology.
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Keywords
development, foreign aid, peer-to-peer, discourse analysis, charity, microfinance, neoliberalism, gift, market