I’m not super interested in stories of growth that put a large emphasis on history, not because I think they’re wrong, but because they don’t offer a lot of practical advice for today. There are a thousand and one papers showing that colonial legacies affect development today, but I don’t see how they help think about increasing growth today. Certainly, I wouldn’t completely generalize from the growth experience of the West, and almost all of the research I cover is about current LMICs or about late industrializers in East Asia.
I agree that advocating strongly for general economic reforms—call it the Lant Pritchett view—is not a useful path. The Pritchett view seems like the only one that EAs know about, which is a big part of my motivation for writing this. Rather than big claims about “growth” as a singular phenomenon, I want to break it down into more granular factors.
Edit: in response to your direct question about whether there’s a first mover advantage, the story is mixed. There’s a lot of evidence that colonial legacies hold countries back today, especially in Africa. On the other hand there’s strong reasons to believe that new technologies are the drivers of growth, and poor countries today have the advantage that they don’t need to reinvent all modern technology—they have all the advantages of frontier knowledge. The net effect of this is so vague as to be unanswerable.
As a concrete example, think about London’s campaign to end cholera in the 19th century. Compared to countries with cholera problems today, those people didn’t even know what caused disease. There were all kinds of crazy views about the causes of disease that made eradicating cholera a difficult task. On the other hand, Britain had a pretty effective state that could enforce public health regulations, and a good scientific establishment that could study the problem. Poor countries today have 1000x more knowledge than rich countries did a century ago, but have all kinds of problems with turning that knowledge into prosperity.
Thanks for your super thoughtful response Karthik. It seems you are aware (perhaps not unsurprisingly!) of the issues I raised and I appreciate your clarification on the “Lant Pritchett view”. I also like your optimism in not focusing on historical wrongs, but rather trying to see what advantages LMICs can leverage. I look forward to your future posts and to learning more about a perhaps more nuanced and effective take on growth as a cause area.
I’m not super interested in stories of growth that put a large emphasis on history, not because I think they’re wrong, but because they don’t offer a lot of practical advice for today. There are a thousand and one papers showing that colonial legacies affect development today, but I don’t see how they help think about increasing growth today. Certainly, I wouldn’t completely generalize from the growth experience of the West, and almost all of the research I cover is about current LMICs or about late industrializers in East Asia.
I agree that advocating strongly for general economic reforms—call it the Lant Pritchett view—is not a useful path. The Pritchett view seems like the only one that EAs know about, which is a big part of my motivation for writing this. Rather than big claims about “growth” as a singular phenomenon, I want to break it down into more granular factors.
Edit: in response to your direct question about whether there’s a first mover advantage, the story is mixed. There’s a lot of evidence that colonial legacies hold countries back today, especially in Africa. On the other hand there’s strong reasons to believe that new technologies are the drivers of growth, and poor countries today have the advantage that they don’t need to reinvent all modern technology—they have all the advantages of frontier knowledge. The net effect of this is so vague as to be unanswerable.
As a concrete example, think about London’s campaign to end cholera in the 19th century. Compared to countries with cholera problems today, those people didn’t even know what caused disease. There were all kinds of crazy views about the causes of disease that made eradicating cholera a difficult task. On the other hand, Britain had a pretty effective state that could enforce public health regulations, and a good scientific establishment that could study the problem. Poor countries today have 1000x more knowledge than rich countries did a century ago, but have all kinds of problems with turning that knowledge into prosperity.
Thanks for your super thoughtful response Karthik. It seems you are aware (perhaps not unsurprisingly!) of the issues I raised and I appreciate your clarification on the “Lant Pritchett view”. I also like your optimism in not focusing on historical wrongs, but rather trying to see what advantages LMICs can leverage. I look forward to your future posts and to learning more about a perhaps more nuanced and effective take on growth as a cause area.