Will the aid industry survive?

Since I started studying in Manchester, the feeling that accumulation of theoretical knowledge on international development in Japan seems even less than that of any developed countries has been growing. That may partially be because the history of development studies in Japan are not so long as that in European countries. Because of its inter-disciplinery nature, development had seemed to be discussed in respective relevant disciplines such as civil engineering, agriculture, and so on, in Japan. This historical discourse of development studies in Japan may be reflected in one of the most prominent characteristics of Japanese development assistance: advantages in relatively larger scale infrastructure development. As it has been famous for high quality of technology, Japan's development assistance has been concentrated on infrastructure development projects, or provision of high-tech equipment, which is often criticised of high costs of operation & maintenance, thus, unsustainability. Through my experience in Africa, individual infrastructure projects are still excellent, Japanese engineers' professionalism are impressively absorbed in local engineers'/ workers' way of working. Hence, from the perspective of very micro level, technical transfer is undoubtedly occuring. However, it is far possible to state that Japanese technical assistance has done very well. Why?
From my impression, this might come from our disadvantage in conceptualisation. Since development as well as technology transfer is closely related to contextual issues such as policy, political stability, history, culture, customs, economic situation, climate, and so on, from its inception, development projects need to take account of these issues as well as technology-specific ones. Although it might not be so hard to feel the existence of those contextual issues, it is not so easy to construct all those issues in order, and to organise a comprehensive design for development project. Through my very short experience of academic activities at IDPM, I've noticed that the number of models(?) for theoretical analysis can definitely affect the quickness and quality of conceptual discussion. When I reflect on Japanese academic fields, especially for disciplines in humanities, I can rarely point out theories originated in my country. It may be quite natural if remembering how the modern academic has developed from the second half of the 19th century in Japan. It seems to me that the people at that time in Japan were too busy to think of the relationships between their own identities and the ideas/ theories being imported from the Western developed nations...