| DevNet - the Aotearoa New Zealand International Development Studies Network - connects academics, students and development practitioners. Anyone involved or interested in international development is welcome to become a DevNet member. It is free and easy; members can find out about other members with similar interests as well as receive the monthly DevNet email update. On the DevNet website, members and non-members alike will find useful information, including a Aotearoa New Zealand development research database, a calendar of development events and notices, discussion forums, and information on Development Studies in Aotearoa New Zealand and useful links. To find out more about how to use the DevNet website click here. To find out more about DevNet itself click here.
INTERNATIONAL PERSPECTIVES
The global financial crisis, the MDGs, the role of the G8/G20/UN, the North-South divide, what about the IMF and World bank?
Interested in understanding more about global development and economics? Do we need a new approach to development? Does decision making require greater democracy, transparency, cooperation and more inclusiveness (especially to benefit the world's poor)?
Check out
Aldo Caliari's piece from
the Center of Concern, his high-quality analysis provides a compelling perspective of where to from here.
You can keep up to date on Al Jazeera's Global Recession page.
DEVNET NEWS
Check out our updated page on Development Studies in Aotearoa New Zealand
We also provide links to international development and likewise organisations - just click here
DevNet 2009 Aotearoa New Zealand university visits
Thank you to all those students and lecturers that participated in the recent DevNet and Dev-Zone visits. We aim to expand our networking for future visits and we'll likely to be presenting beyond development studies classes at Victoria and Massey Universities later this year. If you would like to contact us about future seminars, please email info@devnet.org
DevNet 2008 Conference - Peripheral Vision
The DevNet 2008 conference took place at Victoria University (Wellington, Aotearoa New Zealand) from 3-5 December, 2008. For more information, visit the 2008 conference page.
Conference papers will be available soon. We apologise for the delay as we await permission from individual presenters. If you were a presenter, you can assist by contacting info@devnet.org
Other events
To find out about other development events in Aotearoa New Zealand and globally, you can visit our events page. Dev-Zone's 2009 calander of events is a further useful resource.
 click to open [pdf]
Proceedings from the 2006 DevNet conference now available
The 2006 DevNet conference, 'Southern perspectives on development: dialogue or division?' was held at the University of Otago in Dunedin (Aotearoa New Zealand) from November 30 - December 2, 2006. Printed proceedings are now available. Please visit the 2006 Conference page for more details.
New Zealand Development Scholarships
NZAid's NZDS scheme offers the opportunity to people from selected developing countries to undertake development-related studies in Aotearoa New Zealand. This may include study related to education, health, rural livelihoods, governance, human rights, or economic development, depending on the human resource development training needs of the home government. New Zealand - Development Scholarships are offered for full-time, tertiary level study at participating Aotearoa New Zealand education institutions.Visit the NZAID website for more details. For more information about events, scholarships, courses and a whole lot more, visit DevNet's events page.
The DevNet-NZAID Symposium: Civil Society and Governance: implications for aid .
In partnership with NZAID, in November, 2007, DevNet hosted a two day symposium on Civil Society and Governance.
Printed proceedings from the event are available. For more information (you can also download them as a PDF) see the symposium page.
Other News: .
There is a calendar of upcoming development events, reinvigorated forums, and information on interning. Click here to find out more about using the DevNet website.
Also, we are undertaking a comprehensive update of the DevNet research database. This database contains bibliographic details for as much Aotearoa New Zealand based development research as we could find. We've entered data from previous years. Now, though, it's up to you - if you complete any such research in the near future, please add its details to the database, it only take about 2 minutes to do. You can add your research here. You can also browse the database to see what others are focusing on in their research.
Development is a contested field, with many areas of debate. Unfortunately, we can't all get together in person to talk about these things. That's why we have the DevNet forums. They're a place where you can discuss development with people who share your interest in the field. You can start your own discussion thread, or you can reply to items already posted. To give you an idea of what it's all about, here are some of the topics currently up for discussion.
On March 27 2009, a summit in Wellington (attended by 120 representatives of the aid and development community, businesses and political parties) discussed the future of New Zealand's aid. This forum topic invites discussion and debate on the expected and recommended focus of New Zealand's aid budget and the role of academics and NGOs in influencing policy decisions. The recommendations of the summit provide a starting point for discussion. Aid Doesn't Work! Does It?
You could hardly blame the average New Zealand newspaper reader for being confused when it comes to overseas aid. One week they read Bob Geldof calling the New Zealand government pathetic for giving so little aid the next they read Martin Robinson and Helen Hughes claiming that, far from giving more aid, we should curtail it, as aid does more harm than good. Both of these claims can t be true can they? Surely Bob Geldof (who looks like a nice bloke) wouldn t be advocating for more of something that actually makes things worse. Would he? Welcome to the Great Aid Debate. (click here to read more, and to have your say...) Is Fair Trade Really Such a Good Idea?
In a column written for the Times of London in 2004 English blogger Oliver Kamm had this to say about fair trade: "OXFAM, we learnt last week, is going to back a chain of fair trade coffee bars. Meanwhile Gap clothing company has disclosed that many of the factories that it uses in developing countries do not comply with minimum labour standards. For those consumers whose prime concern is Third World development, the proper course is clear: buy clothes at Gap and avoid Oxfam's coffee." (Is Kamm right? click here to read more, and to have your say...) Is Volunteering Socially Exclusive? (Written by Eli Chisholm) Working for a development NGO, every so often I get asked for advice on how to get into this field. Study is good, I say, and also work experience. Volunteering or doing an unpaid internship is a good way to get this. On top of this it s enjoyable, great to learn from, and you get to do interesting things and meet nice people. Having done volunteer work or an internship probably makes it easier to get a job because you know some people, have got some helpful skills, and you've shown you're really committed to and passionate about development. Then I read this interesting article: Why Not Practice What We Preach?, by British former interns Adam Davies and Tom Allen. To these guys, "unpaid internships are a socially exclusive, and occasionally exploitative, practice, bringing with them the risk that NGOs could be sacrificing principles of long term social justice the very principles we preach for short term gain". (click here to read more, and to have your say...) There's much more to talk about on the forums other threads include: Aid's Critics, a Who's Who; A Truly Costly War; and Development as Explained by Two Cows in a Field; and anything else you would like to talk about...
How you use the DevNet website depends on what you're trying to do. Have a look at the 'how to' questions and answers on our Website Guide page and see if they give you the information you're after. If they don't please feel free to send us an email.
DevNet is administered by Dev-Zone, a global development information and education centre in Aotearoa New Zealand. DevNet acknowledges the support of Nga Hoe Tuputupu-mai-tawhiti, the New Zealand Agency for International Development. |
