The Evolution of Development Theory and Tourism - Tourism and Development: Concepts and Issues - page 55

2003; Telfer & Wall, 1996, 2000). Increased participation is then linked to the
concepts of empowerment and local control over decision-making (Brohman,
1996b). Indigenous development theory received greater attention as did
increased recognition of the role of women in local development (Awa, 1989;
Brohman, 1996b; Gladwin, 1980; Norem et al ., 1989; Momsen, 2004). Moser
(1989) identified five historical approaches to gender studies, which include
welfare, equity, anti-poverty, efficiency and empowerment. The UN declared
the decade from 1975-1985 as the Decade for Women, which coincided with
the Women in Development Approach.
The South Commission (1990) redefined development to be self-directed
and focused on self-reliance. The process of involving local populations and
empowering them is the focus of Participatory Rural Appraisal (PRA)
(Chambers, 1994). Other grass-roots approaches include the learning process
approach (Korten, 1980), the participatory approach (Edwards, 1989) and
the structured flexibility approach (Brinkerhoff & Ingle, 1989). Non-
governmental organisations (NGOs) have increasingly played a role in local
and community-based development initiatives without the burden of gov-
ernment responsibility. NGOs have been able to engage in extensive partici-
patory fieldwork generating innovative solutions to local problems rather
than standardised state solutions (Brohman, 1996b). Friedmann (1966), who
proposed the well-known 'centre-periphery' model, reversed his position
(Friedmann & Forest, 1988) acknowledging the politics of place. He advo-
cates for planning and development based on social learning and indigenous
approaches. Some of these perspectives on the alternative development para-
digm have been carried through into the human development paradigm
which is discussed later in this chapter.
Along with a focus on people, alternative development is closely con-
nected to the environment and sustainability. The concept of sustainability
has developed with the realisation that environmental resources are limited
on our planet (Loening, 1990). Highlighted by the 1987 World Commission
on Environment and Development's (WCED) Our Common Future (1987 ) and
the 1992 AGENDA 21 (Keating, 1994), sustainability has come to mean meet-
ing the needs of the present generation without compromising the needs of
future generations. As Redclift (1987) suggests, the dominant modernisa-
tion, dependency neoclassical paradigms did not incorporate the environ-
ment into development. Now, however, ecological processes and resources
are being increasingly considered as part of the economic system (Barbier,
1989) (see Chapters 3, 9 and 15). The links between the environment and
politics have also come to the forefront in the field of political ecology, which
attempts to describe the spatial and temporal impacts of capitalism on Third
World people and environments (Bryant & Bailey, 1997). Additional envi-
ronmental conferences, such as the Rio

20 Conference in 2012 and the
UNDP's Green Economy Initiative launched in 2008, which focuses on an
economy that results in 'improved human well-being and social equity, while

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