IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/bla/gender/v30y2023i2p529-546.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Theorizing the persistence of local–foreign inequality in international development organizations through the analytic of coloniality

Author

Listed:
  • Emily Cook‐Lundgren

Abstract

This paper theorizes the persistence of inequality between “local” and “foreign” staff in international development organizations. This is a perplexing phenomenon given these organizations' aims of equality and improving lives. The paper draws on qualitative empirical material generated over a three‐month period at an American‐founded development organization in Nairobi, Kenya, including 33 interviews, observation, and organizational documents. Working with the analytic of coloniality, the analysis illustrates how unequal relations persist through the naturalization of racial difference that valorizes Western epistemic perspectives and legitimizes foreign–local difference. The onto‐epistemic grounding of this difference is obscured by organizational discourses of equality, meritocracy, and unity, which enable their persistence. In this paper, I explicate “foreign”–“local” inequality as an effect of the coloniality of development management. By demonstrating how colonial relations of domination enable contemporary inequality, this paper advances an understanding of colonial continuities in development organizations, and contributes to efforts to foreground issues of race in both organizations and international development.

Suggested Citation

  • Emily Cook‐Lundgren, 2023. "Theorizing the persistence of local–foreign inequality in international development organizations through the analytic of coloniality," Gender, Work and Organization, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 30(2), pages 529-546, March.
  • Handle: RePEc:bla:gender:v:30:y:2023:i:2:p:529-546
    DOI: 10.1111/gwao.12826
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://doi.org/10.1111/gwao.12826
    Download Restriction: no

    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1111/gwao.12826?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. rashné limki, 2018. "On the coloniality of work: Commercial surrogacy in India," Gender, Work and Organization, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 25(4), pages 327-342, July.
    2. Miatta Fahnbulleh, 2006. "In search of economic development in Kenya: Colonial legacies & post-independence realities," Review of African Political Economy, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 33(107), pages 33-47, March.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Bethuel Kinyanjui Kinuthia, 2017. "Export Spillovers: Comparative Evidence From Kenya and Malaysia," Journal of African Economies, Centre for the Study of African Economies, vol. 26(1), pages 24-51.
    2. Charles Barthold & Victor Krawczyk & Marco Berti & Vincenza Priola, 2022. "Intersectionality on screen. A coloniality perspective to understand popular culture representations of intersecting oppressions at work," Gender, Work and Organization, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 29(6), pages 1890-1909, November.
    3. M. Winter, 2023. "Carrie's first academic conference—On the possibilities of feminist storytelling and fiction in management," Gender, Work and Organization, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 30(6), pages 2119-2129, November.
    4. Fredrick Ajwang & Saurabh Arora & Joanes Atela & Joel Onyango & Mohammad Kyari, 2023. "Enabling modernisation, marginalising alternatives? Kenya's agricultural policy and smallholders," Journal of International Development, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 35(1), pages 3-20, January.
    5. Sara Stevano, 2023. "The workplace at the bottom of global supply chains as a site of reproduction of colonial relations: Reflections on the cashew‐processing industry in Mozambique," Gender, Work and Organization, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 30(2), pages 496-509, March.
    6. Stephen Fox & Amie Ramanath & Elaine Swan, 2023. "You people: Membership categorization and situated interactional othering in BigBank," Gender, Work and Organization, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 30(2), pages 574-595, March.
    7. Joshua Kalemba, 2023. "The coloniality of labor: Migrant Black African youths' experiences of looking for and finding work in an Australian deindustrializing city," Gender, Work and Organization, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 30(2), pages 612-627, March.

    More about this item

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:bla:gender:v:30:y:2023:i:2:p:529-546. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Wiley Content Delivery (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.blackwellpublishing.com/journal.asp?ref=0968-6673 .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.