EADI was established in the turbulent world of the 1970s. Fast forward fifty years, and the world is equally turbulent. The global South/East and North/West then and now face similar shocks and stressors, although their ability to respond financially, in policy, and in terms of capacity differs dramatically across countries.

Looking backwards, we can note the oil price crisis of the 1970s, the debt crisis and neo-liberal resurgence of the 1980s, the end of the Cold War in 1989, the global financial crisis of the late 2000s, the Arab Spring, and the recent COVID-19 pandemic, among other significant events. We witness a rising number of conflicts within and between countries, most notably the wars in Ukraine and the Middle East and their geopolitical and socio-economic consequences.

Since the 1970s, there have been improvements in a range of basic development indicators, including higher average incomes, reduced infant mortality and child mortality, and wider access to primary education. However, absolute poverty remains pervasive in the global South, and precarity and marginalisation are evident in the North and the South. In much of the North, median wages have stagnated, and poverty has risen, creating new questions for Social Science and potentially, Development Studies in terms of the scope of the field. The post-pandemic context is characterized by higher interest rates and debt servicing leading to austerity measures and the diversion of resources that could otherwise be used for social and productive spending. Across the world, there is the rise of right-wing nationalism and populism. There are also new challenges to democratic ideals, partly linked to digitalisation and new technologies, themselves influenced by geopolitics with states intervening in the elections of other countries.

And on the immediate horizon, climate change is now more evident. Extreme weather events are more frequent, and as agricultural patterns shift with climate change, food production will be volatile. Estimates of migration necessary as a result of climate change are in the order of billions.

How can we understand and respond to these growing incongruences between the need for intensified global cooperation in view of the rising global challenges – climate change, loss of biodiversity, etc. - and the retrograde trend in many countries to look backward to a better past as propagated by populist politicians? What does talk of a “multipolar world” mean? Does it mean a progressive new World Order? And at a national level, is the trend towards increasingly authoritarian/autocratic regimes inevitable or unavoidable?

All of these factors set the context for a series of urgent transitions, including green transitions in energy and adaptation, which will interact with remarkable technological changes, particularly in artificial intelligence, genetic manipulation, and quantum computing in the coming years. It is within this context that the 50th anniversary of EADI takes place.

Dudley Seers, the first President of EADI, stated in his work programme for EADI that "we need to discard the idea that there is such a subject as 'their' problem of development and accept that we are all dealing with common, worldwide problems—though they take different forms in different parts of the world" (The EADI Story 1999, page 91). One could add that the capacity to respond to crises differs not only dramatically between the North/West and South/East but also within the South/East.

During this jubilee year, we aim to critically assess and reflect on development and development studies, responding to the topics raised by our working groups and members over the year, and to today's development challenges.

We intend to generate a kaleidoscope of various views, perhaps rearranging the kaleidoscope to better understand the direction in which the world might be headed. We will have a rolling calendar of events, including local, regional, or international events that fall under the umbrella of the jubilee year.

In summary, as we look ahead, the world today faces multiple crises. We plan to reflect on the past and look forward to assessing what we can expect from the next 50 years and how the world will develop from here.

Under the broad umbrella of reflecting on the past and looking to the future, a set of sub-themes has been identified as follows:

Basile Boulay, EADI

Laura Camfield, University of East Anglia

Susanne von Itter, EADI

Nita Mishra, University of Limerick

Maria Sassi, University of Pavia

Andy Sumner, King's College London

Jürgen Wiemann, former EADI Vice-President