This holiday season, many have filled their pockets with the new Blackberry, Razr, or Slvr cell phones and tossed away their "less-advanced" phones.

What a lot of people don't realize is these secondhand phones are making an important difference in the Third World. Even more, the symbolism of these phones is often misunderstood. The growth of cell phones in the Third World is an example of how the poor help themselves and the direction toward which development policies need to go.

Cell phones are incredibly useful tools not only for college students and businessmen, but also nomadic tribes and the poor. They are practical in the Third World for the reason that unlike in the West, landlines are often expensive and difficult to acquire.

To people in developing nations, cell phones are far more than just a convenient way to have a conversation. They are integral to giving people independence and control over their lives and income.

Rural farmers use their Internet phones to check world prices. Activists have used cell phones to help organize against their government, even toppling the president of the Philippines in 2001. Text messages are used to organize groups worldwide.

These changes are occurring because cell phones are out of the reaach of government censorship; they are mobile, instantaneous and cheap. Indian firms sell phones for less than $15 and phone time for a mere one cent per minute.

Many believe cell phones are a sign of "Westernization" as the Third World becomes more like the United States and Europe. The growth of cell phone use, however, signifies something very different about development.

Cell phones are an example of how the poor can "develop" themselves. With almost no government assistance, the poor make decisions that improve their lives. The utility of cell phones makes them a convenient commodity that has become widespread, and through the basic mechanisms of supply and demand, they are bought and sold.

Providers in the Third World are usually local, meaning the profit stays within the countries, unlike Western-based firms. The industry is also growing rapidly, with more than 100 percent growth rates in some countries.

More profits mean more money is spent locally, encouraging growth in other industries. For example, Mo Ibrahim, founder of Celtel, one of the first and leading African cell phone providers, created a $100 million fund for African entrepreneurs.

Although this process seems excruciatingly simple, most development policies do not take the long-term independence-enhancing interests of the poor into consideration. More often than not, policy-makers act like parents doling out favors to their children. The paternalistic attitudes of leaders and development organizations prevent the simple realization that the poor know what they want. The idea that it is far more rewarding and empowering to provide the tools for people in developing nations to develop themselves needs to accompany the help that larger nations want to give.

Large development organizations such as the World Bank and the United States Development Body decide policies with government elites. Funding usually comes with tight restrictions on how the money is spent and strings attached.

Instead of supporting projects such as cell phones, where the poor use their own initiative to help themselves, projects often have damaging consequences for developing nations.

A dam, for example, may provide more electricity and create jobs, but the poor often can't afford to buy electricity, nor do they have the skills to build the dam. Unfortunately, the poorest groups are frequently relocated for these projects.

The Three Gorges Dam in China over the Yangtze River is an example of this. The $10 billion project has ruined the surrounding environment and forced more than one million people to relocate.

People with no understanding of how the poor survive or what they need on a daily basis decide where billions of dollars are spent. The policies don't work because the intended beneficiaries have no say in their own futures.

While billions of dollars spent on development projects have had spotty results, the $15 phones by and for the people have instigated phenomenal change in only a few years.

The growth of cell phones should be seen as a new example for development and an important step forward on a path created by the poor, not for them.

Reach columnist Brooke McKean at brookemckean@thedaily.washington.edu