Ponna Wignaraja and Akmal Hussain. The Challenge in South Asia: Development, Democracy and Regional Cooperation. New Delhi: Sage Publications. 1989.324 pp.Hardback. Price: Rs 250.00.

Abstract

The challenge presents a rather interesting analysis of the development process in South Asia. It argues that conventional development strategies have failed to alleviate poverty in South Asia. It suggests that the poverty problem can be resolved only through the participatory development approach. The book covers a large number of issues including sustainable development, poverty, aid-dependence, politics, military intervention, religion, women and development, and regional co-operation. Indeed, the analysis is not limited to just economic perspectives; the book also contains sociological, political, and anthropological analysis of the issues. The broad coverage and varied approaches to the development process make it interesting even when the analysis is superficial, the empirical evidence is outdated, and the proposed solution of the given problem is quite conjectural. Without explicitly stating so, it is assumed that the performance of the South Asian economies in terms of per capita incomes has been more than satisfactory and the poverty problem is just a distribution problem. This is to ignore the fact that the per capita incomes in South Asia have grown at a rate of only 1.5 percent as compared with the nearly 8 percent in Korea and China. Still, the participatory development approach for the alleviation of poverty in the region is strongly advocated.