Katine: why political history matters

Over the coming months anthropologist Ben Jones of the London School of Economics will draw on his knowledge of living and working in eastern Uganda to contribute a number of articles and blogs to the Katine site. This is his first article

This site is a great opportunity to bring development projects into the public eye. Unlike most of them, what happens in Katine will be discussed and explored not just in academic circles or NGO boardrooms, but by the wider public.

We can see what impact funding and development has on the ground. We can also openly debate some of the big questions raised by development work: What are governments doing? What do local people find useful in development initiatives? Who benefits most from new opportunities, ideas and resources? What happens when the official projects end?

My academic research on Ugandan society and development led me to spend 18 months living in a small village, similar to the ones in Katine. When I began my fieldwork I wanted to look at how the national government was transforming the lives of ordinary people through development initiatives. By the time I left Uganda, I had a very different perspective.

I found, over time, that the government had very little impact on the day-to-day life of people, and was uninterested in "doing development". For them, the church, the village court, and the marketplace were far more significant. To understand why this is the case we need to know something about Uganda's history and politics.

History matters. People living in Katine, like all of us, have a past. Why does this matter? Past experiences influence the present and explain how people engage with development initiatives. The Katine project is not the first outside intervention in the area. What happened during the colonial and post-colonial period is remembered by people and influences their response to current events.

Politics matters. At a local, national and international level, what happens in Katine is shaped by power relations. Even in a small village, there is violence and social exclusion, while questions concerning ethnicity, religion and class determine who wins and loses in Uganda. So far there has been a lot of debate on the role of international organisations such as the WTO and World Bank but there isn't enough on local or national politics.

Katine's situation is far from unique. This means that we can open up some bigger debates on development in Africa. The fact that the Ugandan government - which is supposed to be one of the continent's best - seems to do so little in Katine raises questions about the way development work is done and publicised in the West. Why is so much aid focused on national governments? Why does so much western development assistance fail to trickle down? Is the national government really interested in rural development?

Katine has come in for considerable criticism from policymakers. Duncan Green of Oxfam criticises the project for doing development "one village at a time". His commentary links into a number of other articles and posts which suggests that there are "right" and "wrong" ways of doing development .

What strikes me though is how much the site opens up a space for new debate and new thinking about development. Getting to know about the history, politics and society of Katine means that we can have a very different discussion about what development might mean and how it operates on the ground.

Instead of treating Africans as passive recipients of aid, or at the tail-end of globalisation and modernisation, we can get a sense of the complexity and politics of life in a rural community. It is a bottom-up approach that gives a different view. Understanding the "small picture" processes of development and change in Katine means we can also think differently about the "big picture" in Africa.

I am going to be blogging on this site on a regular basis to bring my own perspective and background. In the meantime, if you have any questions you can e-mail me at: b.w.jones@lse.ac.uk.