E. F. Schumacher and the search for a postmodern politics.
Item
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Title
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E. F. Schumacher and the search for a postmodern politics.
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Identifier
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AAI8914772
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identifier
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8914772
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Creator
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Longmire, Linda Ann.
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Contributor
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Adviser: Robert Engler
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Date
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1988
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Language
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English
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Publisher
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City University of New York.
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Subject
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Political Science, General | Economics, General | Philosophy | Biography
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Abstract
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This dissertation explores the work of the economist E. F. Schumacher in order to assess his influence on the theory and practice of development. Schumacher's concerns about growth, scale, technology, and the direction of modernization stimulated great controversy during the period of post-colonial development. Chapter one introduces the major contributions and criticisms of Schumacher's work in the conceptual context of development literature. The second chapter examines Schumacher's own life and the progressive transformation of his world view as he moved from an understanding of economics to politics and finally to philosophy and culture. His meta-economics which articulated the values, purposes, and directions of political and economic policy is sketched in chapter three with particular focus on the notions of scale, speed, and self-sufficiency. In chapter four some of Schumacher's most important insights about energy, ecology, and technology in both developed and developing countries are further elaborated. Schumacher's vast cross-cultural experience gave him an appreciation for the role of religion, values, and epistemology in shaping thinking about policy; this is explored in chapter five on "cultural ecology". Chapter six concludes that Schumacher's critique of modernity is more adequately interpreted as "postmodern" than as anti-modern or pre-modern and that this critique intimates, in turn, a postmodern politics.
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Type
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dissertation
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Source
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PQT Legacy CUNY.xlsx
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degree
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Ph.D.
