Abstract This article provides an alternative reading of the history of development by tracing how the concept of development has accumulated its present power. It starts from the premise that whatever development is, it is also a concept which is deeply ingrained in our ‘Western’ habitus and can inform and guide our actions. Contrary to suggestions that it was ‘invented’ once – at whatever date – and then spread elsewhere, I argue that it emerged gradually by being born and reborn several times in different contexts. Thus, its history is not of direct genealogical continuities from a single origin but rather of parallels generated by similar structural circumstances. Although development is commonly criticised for its ambiguity, I argue that much of its power actually stems from its linguistic polyvalence: its different meanings make it useful for many different purposes. Yet the concept is held together by a more coherent structural frame which combines three main senses: ideal, processual and intentional. Building on research on colonial history, I locate a birth of development in European colonialism, where it worked as an unacknowledged condition of colonial exploitation. It also has other antecedents that remain insufficiently understood. Having been introduced in the South as a notion for colonial exploitation of local resources, after World War II its function changed again. At the dissolution of the colonial empires, it was taken into its present use as soft power by Western powers and anti-colonial nationalists alike and was transformed into the foundational concept of developmentalism. But its power has limits. Ultimately, while concepts can and do affect people's behaviour, they work within the dynamics of material and mental interests.

中文翻译：

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发展：概念的历史和力量

摘要本文通过追溯发展概念如何积累其现有力量，提供了对发展历史的另一种解读。它以这样一个前提为出发点：无论发展如何，它也是一个根深蒂固于我们的“西方”习惯中并且可以为我们的行动提供信息和指导的概念。与它是“发明”一次（在任何日期）然后传播到其他地方的建议相反，我认为它是通过在不同背景下出生和重生几次而逐渐出现的。因此，它的历史不是单一起源的直接宗谱学连续性，而是相似结构情况产生的相似性。尽管人们普遍批评发展的含糊不清，但我认为，发展的许多力量实际上源于其语言多样性：它的不同含义使它可用于许多不同的目的。然而，这个概念是通过更加连贯的结构框架结合在一起的，该结构框架结合了三个主要含义：理想，过程性和故意。在殖民历史研究的基础上，我找到了欧洲殖民主义发展的起源，在那里它被认为是殖民剥削的未被承认的条件。它还有其他尚未充分理解的前因。第二次世界大战后，作为一种殖民地开发本地资源的概念在南方被引入，它的功能再次发生了变化。在殖民帝国解体后，西方列强和反殖民民族主义者都将其作为软实力纳入目前的使用状态，并转变为发展主义的基本概念。但是它的力量是有限的。最终，