1 Development Theory and Trends of Development (early 2006 onward) Chay Navuth (Ph.D) 012 489694...

1

Development Theory and Trends of Development(early 2006 onward)

Chay Navuth (Ph.D)012 489694

[email protected]

2

• Sachs: 4 four traps:– Poor nutrition,– Debilitating disease,– Terrible infrastructure,– And high fertility.

Popular Strategies to Have Effective Development (early 2006 onward)

3

• Sachs: “Armchair economists” who do not offer constructive alternatives.

• Easterly (William Easterly- the White Man’s Burden: Why the West’s Efforts to Aid the Rest Have Done so Much Ill and So Little Good): “planners” such as Sachs, seeing more promise in the “searchers” who have historically solved economic problems in a decentralized, piecemeal fashion


4

• Paul Collier- an economist at Oxford (the Bottom Billion: Why the Poorest Countries Are Failing and What Can done about it) : For the Bottom Billion, the long term problem is not that they

have lacked “sustainable, pro-poor growth…it is that they have not had any growth.”

many developing countries are economically stagnant and caught in one or more “traps”:

– Armed conflict,– Natural resource dependence,– Poor governance,– And geographic isolation (which is essentially identical

to Sach’s infrastructure trap).


5

Collier discussed these “traps”:– Armed conflict: “many groups rebelling against brutal

regimes are not romantic freedom fighters, they are profit obsessed resource grabbers.”)

– Natural resource dependence: “…is not simply a matter of soaring currency killing nonresource export…it is more importantly a problem of politics. A centralized source of easy and unaccountable cash tends to annihilate a fledgling democracy by creating patronage machines and lowering the pressure to develop a social contract that comes with effective taxation.”


6

Collier discussed these “traps”:- Poor governance: reforms that can assist growth often go

against the interests of key actors, and when their grip is broken in rare moment of reform, the technical skills necessary to exploit the chance are scarce (this is a direct attack on Sachs, who often suggests that donors invoke poor governance as an excuse to do nothing.

- Other traps: Asian export centers (when an investors expect returns to be low and unpredictable). Self-confidence trap: the government lacks of belief in themselves and expect to fail.


7

• Centerpiece of Collier’s argument (his plan for the G-8):– Aid for post-conflict reconstruction & regional

infrastructure development (can be taken less than 10 years),

– Five international charters addressing: natural resources, democracy, budget transparency, post conflict politics and international investment,

– A trade policy to help bottom-billion countries compete with Asia,

– Selective & very limited military interventions.


8

• Michael Clemens criticized Collier’s argument– Aid for post-conflict reconstruction & regional

infrastructure development impossible as example: Democratic Republic of the Congo or Sudan,

– Five international charters addressing: natural resources, democracy, budget transparency, post conflict politics and international investment resources charter would facilitate: Punish of oil companies that did not “what they pay” to extractive regimes. Even full revenue transparency did not stop Chad’s leaders from shuttering the civil society groups monitoring the use of oil windfall and canceling promised social spending.


9

• Michael Clemens criticized Collier’s argument

– A trade policy to help bottom-billion countries compete with Asia:

• Col: lowering the barriers to the bottom- billion countries Cle: could last only for a few years

• Col: less restrictive rules of trade agreements and special forum in WTO to negotiate Cle.: result of recent Doha Round of trade negotiation casts doubt on the practicality of these ideas

– Selective & very limited military interventions.

Cle.: as a Stanford political scientist- Jeremy Weinstein…”civil wars are far more likely to recur in countries where conflicts have been settled by means of negotiations or a UN intervention than in countries that experienced military victory by one side.


10

Clemens: Collier does not give us a third way that takes us beyond

Sachs versus Easterly. Helping the poor will be a slow job, impossible to end

poverty in 10 or 20 years Requires long term, opportunistic and humble

engagement—through public action “the grievous truth is that although a range of public

actions can and should help many people, most of the bottom billion will not– and cannot– be freed from poverty in our lifetimes.”


11

1. Scale:

- global economy resides inside the global ecosystems as Ecosystem gives economy a place to operate; Supplies all of raw material and supports Economic activity is converting bits and pieces of the ecosystems to human

use (trees/forest lumber & houses, grassland & other habitats farms)

- Ecosystem has suffered as see in headlines: climate change, species extinctions, dwindling rainforests, water shortages…

- Too much carbon floating around

To reduce the scale: 90 majors corporations called on government to set goals for

reducing greenhouse gas emissions; EU has set up a carbon cap-and-trade system; Waste minimization

Make economics truer, greener & more sustainable - State of the World 2008: Innovation for a Sustainable E conomy (the Worldwatch Institute-

Chapter 1- Thomas Prugh & Gary Gardner)

12

2. Stress development over growth make the economy better at satisfying human needs, not simple bigger

- What is an economy is really for? growth? “Growth isn’t even working for many of us [people] in the wealthy nations anymore (US per capita income has triple since 1950,…but share of American who say they’re happy has dropped over last 30 years”

- Studies reveal that…”the more materialistic people are, the lower levels of happiness they report” and “…there appears to be a correlation between rising consumption and the erosion of the things that do make people happy, especially social relationships, family life and a sense of community.

People reject the competition, taking collective action: healthy eating, work leave for new parents and shortened workweeks

Governments of Australia, Canada and the UK wellbeing is a national policy goal and there is a lot of interest indicators that measure wellbeing.

Make economics truer, greener & more sustainable - State of the World 2008: Innovation for a Sustainable E conomy (the Worldwatch Institute- Chapter 1-

Thomas Prugh & Gary Gardner)

13

3. Make prices tell the ecological truth

We are dismantling our life-support machinery: e.g. climate change is the

result of failing to charge the dumping carbon dioxide; human-caused

species extinction. Now governments & business are beginning to experiment with

carbon market, water pricing mechanisms and conservation banking

Make economics truer, greener & more sustainable - State of the World 2008: Innovation for a Sustainable E conomy (the Worldwatch Institute-

Chapter 1- Thomas Prugh & Gary Gardner)

1 Development Theory and Trends of Development (early 2006 onward) Chay Navuth (Ph.D) 012 489694...

Documents

Transcript of 1 Development Theory and Trends of Development (early 2006 onward) Chay Navuth (Ph.D) 012 489694...