Dead Aid: The Cases of International Development Agencies in Uganda, Kenya, and Nepal

Since their advent until now, the international development agencies and their discourses have earned appreciation and scorn around their engagements in Nepali, Kenyan, and Ugandan development context. On the one hand, their centrality in mainstream development has received praise, while, on the other, their promotion of Western, hegemonic, and colonial development paradigms has been widely criticized within the contexts from which this chapter is written. Following the White savior mentality, the charity-narrative has masked the ongoing neocolonialism that communities continue to experience. Hence, drawing on a post-, alternative-decolonized development perspective, this chapter will explore how the idea of development led by the international development agencies itself is dead. The chapter will examine the persistence of West-to-the rest thinking that has perpetuated the continued imposition of Western models and agendas, ignoring indigenous models of responding and preventing social problems. While doing so, it will also suggest how the idea of development can be revived alternatively that withers away from the international development agencies.