Do we use obscure words to impress our colleagues - or fashionable ones to win research proposals? How do poor people define their poverty? How can we use aid budgets most effectively? Are many of our actions against poverty simple, direct... and wrong?

Provocations for Development is an entertaining and unsettling collection of writings that questions concepts, conventions and practices in development. It is made up of short and accessible writings by Robert Chambers, many from the past ten years and some from earlier, reflecting on the evolution of concepts like...