This thesis is an attempt to situate current development theory and prac­tice in a historical context. The basic premise is that formal development projects on Ngazidja since independence have, generally, been unsuc­cessful. This lack of success can only be understood in a wider historical context that recognises contemporary social structures in Ngazidja as being the product of processes that draw deeply on external contacts and influences in constituting viable and strongly incorporative social systems. These processes are not susceptible to controlled intervention, external or internal, but are rather self-driven. This statement may seem self-evident to anthropologists, but is far from being so in the develop­ment industry.