Double-edged development, 1767–

Many writers on development are extremists, either venerating it as the source of economic cornucopia and human fulfilment or denouncing it as bringing loss of authentic community and culture, greater exploitation, and the curtailment of liberty. A minority, however, have taken a more nuanced and ambivalent position—that, like the curate’s egg, development is good in parts. For example, Adam Ferguson acknowledged the benefits of commercial society but warned against the infinite expansion of human wants, increasing inequality, and the loss of community cohesion. Similar emphasis on the mixed results of development arises in the work of J. S. Mill, Friedrich Engels, and Joseph Schumpeter (‘creative destruction’). In more recent times Albert Hirschman pointed out the negative externalities such as environmental pollution caused by economic production growth—but man-made global climate change is a newer version. All change creates both winners and losers and this fuels the extreme evaluation of it.