A developing assembly is disclosed having at least a developer container, a
developer-carrying member and a developer layer thickness regulation
member, wherein the developer is composed mainly of toner particles
containing at least a binder resin and a colorant, and conductive fine
particles, and the developer-carrying member has a substrate and a surface
layer formed on the substrate of a non-magnetic metal, an alloy or a
metallic compound. This developing assembly causes no sleeve ghost,
enables electrostatic latent images to be faithfully developed, causes no
fading phenomenon, and enables high-density images to be formed in every
environment. Also disclosed are a process cartridge having the developing
assembly and the latent-image-bearing member integrally set as one unit
detachably mountable on the main body of an image-forming apparatus, and
an image-forming method making use of the features of this developing
assembly.
