After more than seventy years of theories, policies, partial successes, and resounding failures, one question remains: is development over, or has it merely transformed? There is no clear-cut answer. And perhaps that is precisely the only certainty.
Despite all the criticisms accumulated over time, the economic growth paradigm has never truly faded. GDP remains the primary indicator. International institutions, governments, and financial markets continue to think in terms of expansion.
Development, in everyday policymaking, is still largely synonymous with growth. The adjectives change—sustainable, inclusive, smart—but the core remains the same: produce more, consume more, invest more.
The global mainstream has not given up
The IMF, the World Bank, and major international summits (G7, G20) continue to push in the same direction: market opening, liberalization, and global economic integration. Globalization remains the dominant narrative.
The underlying idea is always the same: better integration into the global system leads to development. Even if the results, for many countries and population groups, remain ambiguous.
There has also been a subtle return to modernization, updated and purged of the naiveté of the 1960s. Today, there's less talk of "Western values" and more of "good governance," efficient institutions, the rule of law, and human capital.
The message has become more technical, less ideological. But the underlying objective remains: to converge toward a model of society that closely resembles that of advanced economies.
A completely changed geography
The biggest change of the last thirty years is the new geography of development. China, India, Brazil, and other emerging countries have reshaped the global balance. Development is no longer a Western monopoly.
Some countries have emerged (at least partially) from the periphery. Others have fallen behind or even regressed. The old "Third World" has fragmented. This diversification makes it even more difficult to speak of "development" in the singular.
Despite overall global growth, extreme poverty persists in many areas, and inequalities within and between countries remain very high.
The paradox is clear: the world produces more wealth than ever, but that wealth is increasingly unevenly distributed. Development creates wealth, but doesn't necessarily spread it.
Dualism and internal polarization
The dualism is no longer limited to countries. It is increasingly present within individual countries as well: large modern metropolises stand alongside abandoned suburbs and countryside, globalized elites and segments of the population excluded from prosperity. Development, when it arrives, is often uneven. It creates islands of wealth in a sea of hardship.
On the one hand, there are those who declare that development as a concept has failed: a Western idea that has promised too much and delivered inequality, environmental crisis, and a loss of meaning. For these thinkers, we must go decisively "beyond development." On the other, there are those who maintain that, despite all its limitations, growth remains the only viable way to reduce mass poverty. It is better to improve the model than to abandon it.
The result is a hybrid system, full of contradictions, where radical criticism and mainstream pragmatism coexist without any one position managing to definitively prevail.
The story isn't over
Development today is neither finished nor resolved. It is an open field, a set of unresolved tensions, a process still evolving. Perhaps the most important lesson we can draw from this long journey is precisely this: there is no definitive theory, no universal recipe, no linear path.
Every development choice has limits, specific contexts, and unpredictable consequences. Understanding those limits, respecting those contexts, and taking responsibility for those consequences is probably the only truly mature attitude we can have. The story continues. And we, with all our doubts, continue to write it.
