How do the intellectual origins and historical background of western and other theories of development affect their relevance to contemporary Third-World conditions? This is the central question behind Gavin Kitching¿s examination of `development studies¿, first published in 1982, from its origins in the late 1940s through to the contemporary era. While presenting the contemporary `radical orthodoxy¿ of development studies, Kitching argues that these theories are continuations of much older traditions of populist and neo-populist thought.