ABSTRACT
The modernist conception of development perceives industrialization and the associated large-scale mechanized agriculture as constituting the core of development. Indeed, large-scale industrialization with the attendant mass production is accorded the crucial role in the project of transforming backward peasant societies into modern capitalist societies. For the proponents of the modernization paradigm, Nigeria and other African countries were so primitive and backward that they lacked the efficient rational base in science, technology and management to support any meaningful transformation of their societies through science and technology. The American model of development with its emphasis on advanced science, technology and managerial efficiency which became hegemonic in development discourse in the post World War II period, reinforced the notion of the attainment of industrial modernity along Western lines, as the main index of development. 1
