Development is not a neutral discourse, but a form of modern-day colonialism which is legitimized by the application of scientific and technical knowledge to the public domain. It is a form of post-"governmentality." The European notion of development is a mechanism that facilitates the establishment of Western capitalism as the global hegemonic power structure. Development has contributed to underdevelopment and is linked to domination and social control and the rise of Western modernity. Development depoliticizes the problems of poverty that it is supposed to solve.