What if one way to reduce poverty involved doing the opposite of what orthodox economics recommends? What if, instead of scaling up enterprises to achieve economies of scale, we supported the small and the localized? Instead of chasing high-tech production for its own sake, we embraced traditional and lower-tech approaches? Instead of urbanizing rapidly, we invested in the vitality of small-scale towns and rural communities? Instead of measuring success through aggregate growth or accumulation, we asked whether everyone had enough?
These elements undergird a “small works” approach to development—one that is not merely aspirational, but rooted in classical economics and grounded in real-world evidence. This talk will focus on examples from China, but fieldwork in China, Thailand, Malaysia, Singapore and Barbados—among many examples worldwide—underscores that small works can significantly reduce poverty at a more sustainable pace of economic growth. These cases challenge conventional development metrics and invite us to reconsider the relationship between scale, technology, community, sufficiency, and well-being.
Dr John Donaldson is an Associate Professor of Political Science at the School of Social Sciences, Singapore Management University (SMU). He researches on politics, rural development and poverty in China and elsewhere, having conducted extensive fieldwork in rural India and Thailand, as well as in Singapore. John Donaldson is the author of Small Works: Poverty and Economic Development in Southwestern China (Cornell University Press, 2011). His research has also been published in such journals as World Development, Journal of Development Studies, International Studies Quarterly, Politics and Society, China Journal, China Quarterly and Journal of Contemporary Asia.
