International Development Buzzwords: Understanding Their Adoption and Use among NGOs, Academics, and the World Bank

• In Event: 1549 - The Rhetoric of Development

Abstract

Scholars and practitioners of international development frequently critique the use of “buzzwords”: words and phrases that reflect fads but whose over-usage threatens to render them meaningless. In this paper, we examine the actual prevalence of these words in development discourse, asking whether academics, donors, or major NGOs tend to a) use buzzwords most, and b) who adopts them earliest. We also analyze how actors in the development community use buzzwords – whether different actors use them differentially, and whether they represent new ideas and approaches or essentially “repackage old wine.” To do so, we compare the prevalence of buzzwords among three separate corpuses of text published since 1990: social science journal articles on nongovernmental organizations (NGOs); World Bank annual reports; and the annual reports of the global NGOs BRAC, Save the Children, and World Vision. Using keyword searches and topic modeling, we trace how the terms reproductive health, gender, participation, and accountability ebbed and flowed over these three literatures. Overall, we find suggestive evidence that the contributors to academic literature are also the leaders of development terminology. Moreover, we argue academic discourse is capable of penetrating and influencing the language of the World Bank rather than vice versa.

Authors

• Allison Youatt Schnable, Indiana University

• Anthony DeMattee, Indiana University

• Jennifer Naomi Brass, Indiana University