Re-politicising South-South development cooperation: negotiating accountability at home and abroad
type: CreativeWork
description: Accountability is a ubiquitous issue in international development cooperation. Development accountability means different things to different actors in the field and has been framed and negotiated in different ways. Governments and civil society groups in the South have historically played an important role in problematising development cooperation accountability, challenging ‘traditional’ donor priorities, ways of working and outcomes. In the 2010s—as Southern development providers grew in material, symbolic and political importance—accountability also emerged as a disputed issue within South-South development cooperation (SSC). This thesis follows a multi-sited and multi-scalar approach to understanding how accountability is being conceived and disputed in the field of SSC, in global and domestic arenas, using Brazil, China and India as paradigmatic sites for inquiry. The study examines how different forms of discursive problematisations of accountability in SSC—coming from different transnational and domestic stakeholders—interact with the politicisation of SSC at different scales, and generates new forms of accountability politics and new instances of negotiation of SSC by different actors. Assessing a kaleidoscopic and rapidly shifting landscape, this thesis shows instances where particular SSC accountability narratives and policy instruments are being generated and travelling across boundaries. It explores the kinds of sociopolitical disputes (development knowledges, geopolitical, bureaucratic and state-society relations) they create. Mapping, tracing and analysing contemporary forms of disputes over SSC accountability across scales and geographies, this study emphasises prevalent global development ‘measurementalities’ pushing Southern providers to craft alternative ways to measure (quantify and evaluate) their ‘development effort’; and the paradoxes counting and showing SSC create domestically. It also emphasises the materiality and thus political salience o…
abstract: Accountability is a ubiquitous issue in international development cooperation. Development accountability means different things to different actors in the field and has been framed and negotiated in different ways. Governments and civil society groups in the South have historically played an important role in problematising development cooperation accountability, challenging ‘traditional’ donor priorities, ways of working and outcomes. In the 2010s—as Southern development providers grew in material, symbolic and political importance—accountability also emerged as a disputed issue within South-South development cooperation (SSC). This thesis follows a multi-sited and multi-scalar approach to understanding how accountability is being conceived and disputed in the field of SSC, in global and domestic arenas, using Brazil, China and India as paradigmatic sites for inquiry. The study examines how different forms of discursive problematisations of accountability in SSC—coming from different transnational and domestic stakeholders—interact with the politicisation of SSC at different scales, and generates new forms of accountability politics and new instances of negotiation of SSC by different actors. Assessing a kaleidoscopic and rapidly shifting landscape, this thesis shows instances where particular SSC accountability narratives and policy instruments are being generated and travelling across boundaries. It explores the kinds of sociopolitical disputes (development knowledges, geopolitical, bureaucratic and state-society relations) they create. Mapping, tracing and analysing contemporary forms of disputes over SSC accountability across scales and geographies, this study emphasises prevalent global development ‘measurementalities’ pushing Southern providers to craft alternative ways to measure (quantify and evaluate) their ‘development effort’; and the paradoxes counting and showing SSC create domestically. It also emphasises the materiality and thus political salience o…
author: Trajber Waisbich, Laura
language: eng
keywords: South-South cooperation, International Development, Accountability, Brazil, India, China
license: https://apollo8-f-pro.lib.cam.ac.uk/bitstreams/5c83c181-bcb2-4b5e-a07c-62d26de1c89e/download
license: https://www.rioxx.net/licenses/all-rights-reserved/
date published: 2021-01-01
date modified: 2026-07-22T22:24:25Z
provider: Cambridge University
publisher: Networked Digital Library of Theses and Dissertations
type: WebPage
source organization: University of Cambridge

PropertyValue
property ID: DOI
value: 10.17863/CAM.72571