The Development Reader brings together fifty-four key readings on development history, theory and policy: Adam Smith and Karl Marx meet, among others, Robert Wade, Amartya Sen and Jeffrey Sachs. It shows how debates around development have been structured by different readings of the roles played by markets, empire, nature and difference in the organization of world affairs. For example, present-day concerns about economic liberalization echo long-standing debates around free-trade, extended divisions of labour and national economic policy. Likewise, old debates about empire are re-appearing in critical perspectives on US policy in the Middle East. While there is little room today for old-fashioned environmental or cultural determinism, the attention now being given to climate change and a clash of civilisations shows that questions of nature and difference remain at the centre of development politics. Section and individual extract introductions guide students through the material