Every December 5th, we celebrate the contributions of volunteers working toward the UN’s Sustainable Development Goals. But there’s a particular kind of volunteerism that often goes unrecognized: the scholars who donate their expertise to rethink how we understand development itself.
Research Committee 37 of the International Political Science Association—“Rethinking Political Development”—represents thousands of hours of unpaid intellectual labor spanning four decades. Dr. Yan Vaslavskiy in Moscow, Dr. Mark Farha, Ms. Tlhokomelo Rethabile Monethi, and board members across Turkey, Canada, India, South Africa, and Brazil all volunteer their time. Like most of IPSA’s operations beyond a small administrative core, RC37 runs entirely on scholarly commitment.
This might seem like a footnote to the committee’s intellectual work. In fact, it’s central to understanding what makes RC37’s approach to development theory revolutionary.