> Leys is a specialist in "development theory", Africa in particular.
> According to Sam Pawlett, he comes at things from the same angle as Robert
> Brenner which is to say that he is skeptical of the"development of
> underdevelopment" thesis--another way of saying that imperialism exists.
>
Don't know if I'd go that far. Leys used to espouse a dependency theory
see esp. his *Underdevelopment in Kenya* (1974,U of Cal.) a classic
Baran-type analysis. He says "To my mind underdevelopment theory
represents an immense advance, politically and intellectually, over
conventional development theory (or modernisation theory-SP)." pxii. In
the last 20 or so years though, he has given up on it for he contends
that dependency or underdevelopment theory has failed to explain the
"African Tragedy" as he puts it. He now seems to think that sub-saharan
Africa has never been capitalist at all and this is one of the problems.
Leys now, justifiably I guess, is resigned to complete pessimism as
everything tried in S. Africa has failed completely and only made the
overall socio-economic-political situation worse. The situation there
today is about as good as it's going to get barring significant drastic
changes in the international political economy. A more optimistic (and
complete) analysis is given by Patrick Bond in his various books.
Sam Pawlett
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