Between Promise and Skepticism: The Global South and Our Role as Engaged Intellectuals

Focusing on the benefits and limitations of the Global South concept and its fundamentally different readings, this article seeks to problematize our own role when using the term both as scholars and as engaged intellectuals. Historically, the Global South has been invoked by scholars and intellects from the so-called developed and less developed world alike. While the term has been used as a tool to denounce injustices, dependencies, and "subalternity," it has also helped to reify problematic North-South dichotomies that have entrenched practices of inequality and domination. I argue that the heuristic, intellectual, and political value of the Global South requires a more thorough discussion. Merely welcoming it as a refreshing playground for unsettling old and unfair ordering systems seems insufficient. Offering a hopeful yet skeptical reading of the Global South, this article seeks to question that this category necessarily leads to radical transformations. To the contrary, it may reify rather than overcome injustices just like the previous concept of the "Third World." I argue that it is vital to distinguish between the vocabulary's desired outcomes and its likely real effects. If our goal is to change the world (and not just parrot a utopian buzzword), we may need to elaborate precise conceptualizations and reflect upon their concrete—not just imagined—consequences. It is precisely the Global South concept's Janus-faced nature that has led to its success; while we cannot fully endorse it given its danger of abuse, we can neither completely abandon it given its interventionist potential.