Overview

"In """"Surrogates of the State"""", Jennings explores the delicate relationship between development NGOs and the states they work in using his exhaustive and illuminating case study of Tanzania in the 1960s and 70s. During that time Tanzania instituted the rural socialist Ujamaa program, resulting in the forced resettlement of 6 million people to villages, transforming the map of the country. Rather than questioning this policy, NGOs working in the area (as typified by Oxfam) became surrogates of the state, helping to carry out the program.Jennings argues that the NGO community was seduced by its own interpretations of what Ujamaa represented, and was consequently blinded to the dark realities of resettlement. Bound by ideological chains of their own forging, organizations that in other contexts have criticized over-mighty states and the use of overt force, NGOs committed themselves fully to Tanzania and its development policy. Through this study, the book uncovers not just the story of development in Tanzania in this critical period, but the history of the NGO itself. And in doing so, raises questions about the future direction of this institution which has become so prominent in international development."

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9781565492431

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Jennings has written an interesting book dealing with the role of NGOs in development, focusing on the role of Oxfam in Tanzania. I highly recommend it. Given the increasing role played by Northern NGOs in the promotion of civil society and development in the global South, it is a book that could have been written about NGO work in any country in the developing world.

Jennings has written an interesting book dealing with the role of NGOs in development, focusing on the role of Oxfam in Tanzania. I highly recommend it. Given the increasing role played by Northern NGOs in the promotion of civil society and development in the global South, it is a book that could have been written about NGO work in any country in the developing world. Marked by crisp prose and solid judgement throughout, Surrogates of the State makes an important contribution to both the history of post-colonial Tanzania and the historical study of NGOs generally. Michael Jennings opens the doors of Tanzania s development process and of Oxfam s essential contributions to it. NGOs are neither a panacea nor a villain as this empirically-grounded and readable book makes clear. Numerous examples of concrete ways to overcome structural and ideological constraints - of governments and of private agencies - are visible for practitioners and scholars alike. This book enhances our knowledge of a particularly important period in post-independence Tanzania and should be of interest to anyone interested in the challenges facing NGOs working in the development field in Africa.

Author Information

"Michael Jennings is a lecturer and researcher in East African politics, and the politics of development. A major focus of his work has been on the role of voluntary agency activity in development in East Africa, including NGOs, missions and faith-based organizations more widely. He is interested in the multiple roles which """"development"""" as a process and as an idea takes on, and the synergies between power, politics and development in the North and South. He has worked extensively on the role of civil society in development, and has research interests in health issues in sub-Saharan Africa."

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