Karamat Ali, Pakistan: The political economy of rural development

Abstract

Putting together a collection of articles is not an easy task. The area covered by the present book under review is extremely diverse and thus makes the selection doubly difficult. By corollary, to review such a collection presents peculiar difficulties. Almost all of the articles in the book have been previously published elsewhere. The exceptions include the first (by Karamat Ali) which provides an introduction to the overall problems of rural development and agricultural modernisation in Pakistan. Since this article is by the editor and is also the first in the collection, I am assuming that it attempts to set the general tone of the book and provides an insight into the various problems that are to be dealt with. Unfortunately the book does not state explicitly where and when each of the articles was previously published. The list of authors is indeed impressive and the collection includes some very well known articles covering the social, political and economic aspects of rural development in Pakistan. Since some of the articles need little introduction and it would require too much time and space to review each article separately it would be best to review the book as a whole and refer to specific articles where relevant or necessary.

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