The Quest for Prosperity
How Developing Economies Can Take Off - Updated Edition
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- 16,99 €
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- 16,99 €
Beschreibung des Verlags
Justin Yifu Lin's groundbreaking account of how developing countries can help themselves—now fully updated
How can developing countries grow their economies? Most answers to this question center on what the rich world should or shouldn't do for the poor world. In The Quest for Prosperity, Justin Yifu Lin—the first non-Westerner to be chief economist of the World Bank—focuses on what developing nations can do to help themselves. Lin examines how the countries that have succeeded in developing their own economies have actually done it. Interwoven with insights, observations, and stories from Lin’s travels as chief economist of the World Bank and his reflections on China’s rise, this book provides a road map and hope for those countries engaged in their own quest for prosperity.
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In the 1960s, conventional economic thinking was that Africa had "better conditions and opportunities for economic development" than did East Asia. Lin, the chief economist and senior vice president for the World Bank from 2008 to 2012, tackles prevailing shibboleths in this provocative and challenging work. Lin argues that "different countries... require different policy choices to facilitate growth"; indeed, developing nations that progressed industrially and technologically "rarely followed... the dominant development paradigm of the time." Lin concludes that the Soviet Stalinist model of modernization through industrialization provided a poor precedent for subsequent leaders whose zest for large capital-intensive projects was inappropriate, especially since developing nations rarely have abundant available capital. Lin focuses on the concept of comparative advantage, which indicates that nations should concentrate on "what they can produce best" and trade with other nations that do likewise. He extends this argument by linking a country's advantage to its factor endowments the traditional elements of land, labor, and capital, as well as infrastructure. Lin embellishes his conceptual innovations with lessons from failures, successes, and strategies for implementing these ideas. While there is no easy answer to these problems, Lin's reminder that such development is not a "zero-sum game" suggests that his thoughtful study should resonate among international audiences.
