Prof. Dr. Suman Dhakal

Following the liberation of the new states from colonial rule after the Second World War, the word “Development” has become very popular in those states. Scholars from different disciplines in the social science sector have brought out a series of articles on this aspect.

The pre-War terms for development presupposed progress and evolution, terms which were more popular during the pre-War years, but have since become passé.

The possible replacements for these terms are change, growth, transformation, modernization and westernization.
Just as the term “Development” has been variously defined by the authors of social sciences in their respective fields, political development has also emerged as a new focus in political studies. Lucian Pye, J. La Palombara, G.A. Almond, W.H. Wriggins, and D.C. Apter, are some of the political scientists who have made important contribution to the study in the context of political development.

In 1963, a committee on comparative politics, under the chairmanship of G.A. Almond, entered into a large publication program on developing countries. The main purpose of this committee was to bring together writers working in the field of political development and to relate their studies at a conceptual level, in with the areas of communications, bureaucracy, political modernization, education, political culture, etc.
The committee brought volumes of publication on various aspects of political development.
Those who contributed to it were Lucian Pye, J. La Palombara, D.A. Rustow, M, Weiner, and many others.
It would be wrong to think that this effort has led to any success in the evolution of a final theory of political development.
Still the fact cannot be ignored that some very valuable ideas, were thrown up by them which have proved to be of great importance to subsequent theory building in this field.

Several writers have emphasized the political development is mainly a function of the level of economic development pointing out that if the political institutions of a country do not satisfy the economic aspiration of the various classes of its society, it can lead to political turmoil, even revolution.
Organski in this context emphasizes economic development than building up political institutions. On the other hand, most of the earlier writers on political development were more concerned with identifying the characteristics which distinguished the developing societies of the third world from the developed societies of the west than with a study of the stages through which societies move toward development, or the forces which induce and accelerate the process of development.
Political scientists have defined political development in ways. Lucian Pye views political development as a general process of social and cultural changes in the context of a continuing sense of community.
He, supposed to be the most influential of the authors, has presented eleven definitions of political development, and is among the earliest writers to analyze the concept of political development in depth, and has been developing his ideas on the subject over the years.
He is of the view that in the light of political development the ethics of cultural relativism has impeded thought about the problems of development of the third world. One of the concepts taken up by Pye is institutionalization defined as the establishment of administrative and legal structures of the political system capable of carrying out effective decision making process.

Almond and Powell defines political development as “The increased differentiation and specialization of political structures and the increased secularization of political culture”.
They suggest that the significance of political development lies in the increased effectiveness and efficiency of the performance of the political system and its capabilities. They mention five capabilities of a political system: extractive capability, regulative capability, distributive capability, responsive capability, and symbolic capability.
According to Almond and Powell there are at least five major factors which must be considered in the analysis of political development.
These factors are stability, resources, development in other social systems, functioning pattern, and the response of the political elites to political challenges.
Huntington defines political development as institutionalization of political organizations and procedures.
He identifies political development with some key aspects of modernization, rationalization, national integration, democratization, and mobilization or participation.
Huntington also mentions four characteristics of institutionalization, which are creation of complex, autonomous, coherent, and adaptable political organizations and procedures.
According to him, the level of political development, i.e., institutionalization of a society in large part depends upon the extent to which political activists also belong to and identify with a variety of political institutions.
He has played an important role in keeping political development apart from socio-economic modernization. He challenges the idea that political development could be thought in terms of stages or as an uni-linear process.
One major concept which Huntington has contributed to the study of political development is that of political decay. According to him institutions decay and dissolve as well as grow and mature. His criteria, for the political development is, the “Institutionalization of political organizations and procedures”.
His identification of political development with institution building is based on the approach that “a well institutionalized polity would be marked by high level of adaptability, complexity, autonomy and coherence.
David Apter in his studies emphasizes four major characteristics of political development: differentiation (increasing specialization of roles, plus their integration), stability (capacity to make decisions that solve the problems without any major disturbance), choice (an increasing capacity to innovate, and to be flexible), and emulation (the imitation of foreign models, especially industrialized western societies).
With these characteristics Apter focuses increasingly upon the capacity to make choice and regime stability as the central problems involved in political development.
In the words of W.H. Wriggins, political development means “the growth of the institutions and practices that allow a political system to deal with its own fundamental problems more effectively in the short run, and working towards more responsiveness of the regime to popular demands in the long run”.
According to M. Needler, political development is extension of the polity to include the maximum number of participants taking part in political processes in terms of equality, whereas G.S.
Masannat defines it as “the capacity of a political system to sustain continuous change”.
Similarly, S.N. Eisenstaedt viewed it as “an institutional framework capable of continuous absorption of changes”. According to him such changes are typically, if not always, associated with the increasing stability and durability of regimes.
Alfred Diamant believes “political development is a process by which a political system acquires an increased capacity to sustain successfully and continuously new types of organization”, and maintains that, “Political development is generic of successfully sustaining new demands, goals, and organizations in a flexible manner.”
In case of the “developing nations” it means the meeting of particular goals and demands.
While the early definitions of political development tend to make the term synonymous with democratization, the more recent definitions have dropped this characteristic. Instead, they are more likely to stress the capacity of a regime to maintain order and survive. Most definitions of political development indicate, capacity and decision making capabilities as two key characteristics of the term. In fact, we find many definitions of political development contain references to an increasing capacity to choose, to make decision, and to be effective at the collective level of action.
This suggests that political development is a process which involves decision making or, rather, increase in the capacity to make decisions.
However, if we stress the positive aspects of the definitions of political development, we must have in mind something like “democratization”, namely an increasing capacity of citizens to help shape policies and make choices and to impose restraints on ruling elites.
The central theme of political development is the concept of self-affirmation, and, also the ultimate value goal of all actions.

In its macro aspect political development is concerned with the direction of the aggregative impact of transformation capacity on the lines of the members of a given community; and in its micro aspect it is concerned with goal orientations as devised or realized by individuals in their social and psychological interactions.
Going through these definitions, concepts, and the characteristics of political development put forward by various authors we may conclude that the phenomenon of political development in most part of the world, especially in developing countries, is a new aspiration of for democracy, institutionalization of political organizations, mass participation, and good administration.
In this respect, the political development of a country is fundamentally connected with the building of democracy with greater participation. Most of the writers on political development, as Daya Krishna points out, have used participation as a basic criterion for judging and measuring political development. But it can also be explained in terms of the consciousness of people and their pressures on future development.
Political development becomes necessary in a larger context to involve a political system’s stability and capacity of its institutions to adjust to the social environment and political values to serve the people’s needs.
The role of a state, ruler’s attitude, motive of political leaders, and the capacity of political institution to meet the needs of people and political values, together form the basis of a nation’s political development.
Political development, finally, is not always a smoothly going process, because deep interests and motivations are involved in the performance of all kinds of political functions.
Ideology, leadership, question of integration and stability, socio-cultural and traditional values and beliefs of the people are all important aspects that are intimately concerned with the process of political development in developing countries, particularly because political development has a dynamic and definite meaning for these countries, where demands for human wants need to be harmonized with the socio-economic conditions, religious beliefs, and cultural values.
Political development is undoubtedly connected with the increasing involvement of citizens in polity-related activities which is again a function of individual citizen’s attitude and ability to participate.
M. Halpern states that political development is not an end product but a continuing process, it is the persistent capacity of the system to cope with a permanent revolution, or as continuous change.

References:

1. Alfred Diamant: “The Nature of Political Development”, in J.L. Finkle and R.W. Gable(ed.): Political Development and Social Change, (London: John Wiley and sons, 1966).
2. Daya Krishna: Political Development: A Critical Perspective, (Delhi: Oxford University Press, 1979).
3. Fred W. Riggs: “Development” in G. Sartori(ed.): Social Science Concepts: A Systematic Analysis, (California: Sage Publications, 1984).
4. G.A. Almond and G.B. Powell: Comparative Politics: A Development Approach (New Delhi: Amerind Publishing Co. Pvt. Ltd., 1972).
5. Joseph La Palombara (ed.): Bureaucracy and Political Development, (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1967
6. Lucian W. Pye: Aspects of Political Development, (New Delhi: Amerind Publishing Co. Pvt. Ltd., 1972).
7. M. Halpern: “Towards Further Modernization of the study of New Nations”, World Politics, XVII, October 1964.
8. S.N. Eisenstaedt: “Bureaucracy and Political Development”, in J. La Palombara (ed.): Bureaucracy and Political Development, (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1967).
9. S.P. Verma: Modern Political Theory, (Delhi: Vikas Publishing House, 1975).
10. Subir Das Gupta: Political Growth and Political Development, (Calcutta: Prajna, 1984).

(This article is already published in 1993, in the Annual Journal of “POLSAN” Vol. 2.): Editor.

Thank you Professor Suman Dhakal for the article

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