School

My timetable is still a bit of a surprise each day, since I can't be sure I've checked where I'm supposed to go properly. I do know though that this term I am taking 4 or 5 courses.

Development Histories, Theories and Practices - This is an overview of the major thinkers and themes in development. The professor talked about and critiqued Alan Thomas and Amartya Sen today. Sen speaks of development as freedom; his five basic freedoms are both a cause and a result of development. A memorable moment is when a (Filipino?) student asked,

"But what about Singapore? Some of the freedoms are not present, but it still developed so fast."

I also met girls from Kenya and Ghana. Apparently these two countries had higher GDPs than Singapore about 50 years ago, so their home institutions constantly use Malaysia and Singapore as case studies in trying to find what went wrong in their countries. Did you know Ghana also grows a lot of oil palm? They just haven't been able to industrialise and that commodity the way that Malaysia did.