The desire to help fellow human beings, and natural curiosity, provide a first justification for an affirmative answer to this question, but should be placed on the practice of curiosity (eg on the location of the study)? Despite updated definitions of ‘development’, in fact development studies is still largely the study of poor states by students from those countries. Can Britain claim an advantage in such teaching, or is it an interest inherited from the experience of empire and now taken over by aid? Finally, despite all doubts, and though the courses are far from perfect, the conclusion is that they do have value as ‘half a loaf’, given that they are not displacing alternative initiatives in the developing countries themselves.