[PDF] The Persistence Of Underdevelopment eBook

Author : George L. Beckford
Publisher :
Page : 346 pages
File Size : 16,77 MB
Release : 1999
Category : Business & Economics
ISBN : 9789766400743

GET BOOK

This is a revised edition of a seminal work on the nature of underdevelopment. It includes a new foreword and appendixes on the significance of plantations to Third World economies and the contribution that George Beckford made to Caribbean economic thought.

Author : Raghuram Rajan
Publisher :
Page : 62 pages
File Size : 27,2 MB
Release : 2006
Category : Developing countries
ISBN :

GET BOOK

This paper suggests that the persistence of underdevelopment is not necessarily due to the existence of bad political, and consequently economic, institutions but that the deeper reason is the existence of self-perpetuating constituencies. Changing explicit institutions without changing the constituencies backing them is likely to be a futile exercise, for the constituencies against change will find a way around the constraints imposed by the institutions.

Author : Raghuram G. Rajan
Publisher :
Page : 61 pages
File Size : 35,99 MB
Release : 2007
Category :
ISBN :

GET BOOK

Why is underdevelopment so persistent? I argue that one reason is the initial inequality in endowments and opportunities, which leads to self-interested constituencies that perpetuate the status quo. Each constituency prefers reforms that preserve only its rents and expand its opportunities, so no comprehensive reform path may command broad support. Though the initial conditions may well be a legacy of the colonial past, persistence does not require the presence of coercive political institutions. This may be why underdevelopment has survived independence and democratization. On the one hand, such an analysis offers hope that the destiny of societies is not preordained by the political institutions they inherit through historical accident. On the other hand, it suggests we need to understand better how to alter factor endowments when societies may not have the internal will to do so.

Author : Raghuram G. Rajan
Publisher :
Page : 64 pages
File Size : 16,97 MB
Release : 2008
Category :
ISBN :

GET BOOK

Why is underdevelopment so persistent? One explanation is that poor countries do not have institutions that can support growth. Because institutions (both good and bad) are persistent, underdevelopment is persistent. An alternative view is that underdevelopment comes from poor education. Neither explanation is fully satisfactory, the first because it does not explain why poor economic institutions persist even in fairly democratic but poor societies, and the second because it does not explain why poor education is so persistent. This paper tries to reconcile these two views by arguing that the underlying cause of underdevelopment is the initial distribution of factor endowments. Under certain circumstances, this leads to self-interested constituencies that, in equilibrium, perpetuate the status quo. In other words, poor education policy might well be the proximate cause of underdevelopment, but the deeper (and more long lasting cause) are the initial conditions (like the initial distribution of education) that determine political constituencies, their power, and their incentives. Though the initial conditions may well be a legacy of the colonial past, and may well create a perverse political equilibrium of stagnation, persistence does not require the presence of coercive political institutions. We present some suggestive empirical evidence. On the one hand, such an analysis offers hope that the destiny of societies is not preordained by the institutions they inherited through historical accident. On the other hand, it suggests we need to understand better how to alter factor endowments when societies may not have the internal will to do so.

Author : Jay Mandle
Publisher : Routledge
Page : 187 pages
File Size : 27,7 MB
Release : 2010-11-26
Category : Business & Economics
ISBN : 1136877525

GET BOOK

First published in 1996, this insightful and informative text examines the post-emancipation and recent economic history of the Commonwealth Caribbean. Jay R. Mandle offers an explanation of the region’s continuing underdevelopment. Through the use of an analytical framework derived from the works of Marx and Kuznets, the book focuses attention on technological change as the driving force behind economic modernization. Persistent Underdevelopment begins by exploring how plantation agriculture had a limiting effect on industrial growth. Ultimately, plantation dominance receded; technological stagnation continued, however, and, under British colonial policy the Caribbean failed to modernise. The post-World War II era brought new efforts at modernisation through the economic policies of the left regimes of Manley, Burnham and Bishop. The concluding chapters point the way to policies that would enable the Caribbean to escape its current poverty and become an effective participant in world markets, finally achieving the goal of modern economic development.

Author : Walter Rodney
Publisher : Verso Books
Page : 416 pages
File Size : 21,47 MB
Release : 2018-11-27
Category : History
ISBN : 1788731204

GET BOOK

The classic work of political, economic, and historical analysis, powerfully introduced by Angela Davis In his short life, the Guyanese intellectual Walter Rodney emerged as one of the leading thinkers and activists of the anticolonial revolution, leading movements in North America, South America, the African continent, and the Caribbean. In each locale, Rodney found himself a lightning rod for working class Black Power. His deportation catalyzed 20th century Jamaica's most significant rebellion, the 1968 Rodney riots, and his scholarship trained a generation how to think politics at an international scale. In 1980, shortly after founding of the Working People's Alliance in Guyana, the 38-year-old Rodney would be assassinated. In his magnum opus, How Europe Underdeveloped Africa, Rodney incisively argues that grasping "the great divergence" between the west and the rest can only be explained as the exploitation of the latter by the former. This meticulously researched analysis of the abiding repercussions of European colonialism on the continent of Africa has not only informed decades of scholarship and activism, it remains an indispensable study for grasping global inequality today.

Author : Jay Mandle
Publisher : Routledge
Page : 205 pages
File Size : 37,2 MB
Release : 2010-11-26
Category : Business & Economics
ISBN : 1136877533

GET BOOK

First published in 1996, this insightful and informative text examines the post-emancipation and recent economic history of the Commonwealth Caribbean. Jay R. Mandle offers an explanation of the region’s continuing underdevelopment. Through the use of an analytical framework derived from the works of Marx and Kuznets, the book focuses attention on technological change as the driving force behind economic modernization. Persistent Underdevelopment begins by exploring how plantation agriculture had a limiting effect on industrial growth. Ultimately, plantation dominance receded; technological stagnation continued, however, and, under British colonial policy the Caribbean failed to modernise. The post-World War II era brought new efforts at modernisation through the economic policies of the left regimes of Manley, Burnham and Bishop. The concluding chapters point the way to policies that would enable the Caribbean to escape its current poverty and become an effective participant in world markets, finally achieving the goal of modern economic development.

Author : Raghuram G. Rajan
Publisher :
Page : pages
File Size : 17,70 MB
Release : 2006
Category :
ISBN :

GET BOOK

Initial inequality in endowments and opportunities, together with low average levels of endowments, can create constituencies in a society that combine to paralyze reforms, even though the status quo hurts them collectively. Each constituency prefers reforms that expand its opportunities, but in an unequal society, this will typically hurt another constituencý's rents. Competitive rent preservation ensures no comprehensive reform path may command broad support. Though the initial conditions may well be a legacy of the colonial past, persistence does not require the presence of coercive political institutions, perhaps one reason why underdevelopment has survived independence and democratization. Instead, the roots of underdevelopment may lie in the natural tendency towards rent preservation in a divided society.