Oral History of Development Cooperation

This Open Access book provides a comprehensive historical overview of Japan’s development cooperation based on oral evidence. Some of the projects this book portrays date back to the 1960s. The book draws extensively on the lively and spirited narratives provided by 288 people, mostly project counterparts in developing countries, whom the author interviewed between 2018 and 2024. The research covers six Asian, four African, and three Latin American countries, with the sectors of projects ranging from agriculture and fisheries to manufacturing, infrastructure, education, health, and human security. The stories told by the witnesses are full of passion, retrospection, and careful judgment, combined with factual information provided in JICA’s expert reports. Each project has evolved in a self-contained way with its own logic, but when they are all combined in a single book, a holistic picture of Japan’s development cooperation emerges.Historically, one of the basic principles of Japan’s ODA has been to support the self-help efforts of developing countries. In this book, storytelling on the donor side is relegated to the background, and the voices of people in developing countries are amplified instead. Drawing on the principal-agent theory, the book creates an original space for stakeholders in developing countries, especially the local professionals who have played a key role in their nation-building efforts, such as teachers, medical doctors, engineers, agricultural extension workers, municipal officers, etc. These professionals are called “counterparts” of Japanese experts and have been the direct targets of hands-on technology transfer. In addition, the book carefully explains how these projects have overcome political and environmental crises as well as critical circumstances related to organizational sustainability. Readers are expected to learn a great deal from the project histories presented in this book.Japan began its ODA in 1954, a decade before it joined the OECD in 1964, and became a top donor country in the 1990s. To date, many countries Japan has assisted have achieved remarkable growth and joined the ranks of emerging donors. The history of Japan as the first nation in the world that has crossed the border from the South to the North, as well as its experience of rapid recovery from its defeat in World War II, is embedded in the modality of its development cooperation. The experience of Japan’s development cooperation, as evidenced in this book, will provide eye-opening lessons for countries in the Global South as well as those in the donor camp.The book is a translation of the original Japanese version, which was published in March 2023 as the sixth in the seven-volume series of the outcomes of a research project, “Japan’s Development Cooperation: A Historical Perspective,” designed and implemented by the JICA Ogata Sadako Research Institute for Peace and Development.  In this era when development cooperation undergoes drastic transformation, it is crucial for us to learn from past experience to inform future strategies. Japan’s approach has focused on teaching people how to fish rather than giving them fish, thereby fostering unbreakable bonds of trust with local people. This book vividly depicts how these trusting relationships enabled development projects to overcome unforeseen challenges and crises. By sharing narratives of those involved, the book also reveals their expectation, frustration, and a shared sense of accomplishment. This book is a must read for anyone interested in the future direction of global efforts in development cooperation.Tanaka Akihiko, President, Japan International Cooperation Agency (JICA)