From Conditionality to Convergence: Tracing the Discursive Shift in Homo-Developmentalism

Abstract This article furthers the scholarship on homo-developmentalism by analysing a recent discursive shift in the homo-developmentalist discourse from conditionality to a new narrative of convergence. Appearing in several recent research reports published by various development agencies, this narrative describes the relationship between LGBT rights and economic development as one that is mutually constitutive. This article interrogates how the narrative of convergence was constructed by attending to the indicators utilised in the various research reports and considers the implications of this discursive shift in terms of how it sustains the development project and Western civilisational exceptionalism through the construction of a new binary of LGBT-inclusive/LGBT-phobic. It concludes with a brief discussion on negotiating the complex entanglements of Western imperialism in pursuing the advancement of human flourishing.