Seven Decades of ‘Development’, and Now What?

Year 2015 is slated as a year of transformation to address unprecedented political, ecological, social, gender and economic inequities. UN negotiations are underway to produce new sustainable development goals (SDGs). The paper argues that ideas matter in the conceptualisation of development agendas, which in turn depend on power constellations within and between the first UN—the member states, the second UN—the UN secretariat and agencies, and the third UN—civil society. The paper tracks past development decades and examines whether the SDGs can and will be as visionary as the UN Charter adopted in 1945, which created moral pressure for institutional and policy change. Copyright © 2015 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.