The Sociology and Politics of Development A Theoretical Study [Hardcover]

Originally published in 1980, this work answers the crucial question of how social change should be guided in the developing countries. Professor Varma begins by posing the problems of the general scope of modernization and the general criteria used in the modernization process. He examines carefully some of the models that have been used for this purpose in the past, providing extensive summaries of the views on modernization of theorists in various social science disciplines, including sociology, politics, economics, and anthropology, and stresses the importance of these views in guiding policy decisions. The book concludes with a comparison of the development processes of the United States, the Soviet Union, China, Japan and India.

1. Cultural Relativism, Eurocentrism and Marxs Asiatic Mode of Production  2. The Anti-Imperialist Reaction and the Marxist Pre-emption of Economic Imperialism Theory  3. Policies and Politics in the Struggle for the Third World  4. The Marxist Response to Western Developmentalism  5. The Overthrow of the Orthodoxies and the Progress of the West