Industrial Policy and Development: The Political Economy of Capabilities Accumulation

In the 1990s, development policy advocated by international financial institutions was influenced by Washington Consensus thinking. This strategy, based largely on liberalization, privatization, and price-flexibility, downplayed, if not disregarded, the role of government in steering the processes of technological learning and economic growth. With the exception of the Far East, many developing countries adopted the view that industrial policy resulted in inefficiency and poor economic growth.

Ample historical evidence shows that industrial policy does work, when the right technologies and industries are supported and when appropriate combinations of policy measures are implemented. This book provides an in-depth exploration of which industrial policies have been successful, the trade-offs associated with these microeconomic approaches to growth and development, and the opportunities and constraints associated with the current organization of international economic relations.

M. Cimoli is Professor of Economics at the University of Venice (Ca' Foscari) since 1992 and Economic Affair Officer at ECLAC (Economic Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean) of UNITED NATIONS since 1999. He obtained a DPhil at the SPRU (University of Sussex) and he has held a number of visiting appointments in different universities and institutions (University of Pisa, University Metropolitan of Mexico (UAM), University of Campinas, etc).

Giovanni Dosi is Professor of Economics at the Scuola Superiore Sant'Anna in Pisa and Visiting Professor at the University of Manchester. His major research areas include economics of innovation and technological change, industrial organisation and industrial dynamics, theory of the firm and corporate governance, economic growth and development. Professor Dosi is Co-Director of the task forces on Industrial Policy and Intellectual Property Rights at the Initiative for Policy Dialogue, Columbia University, New York; Continental Europen Editor of Industrial and Corporate Change, Research consultant for Italian and international public and private institutions, and Honorary Research Professor at the University of Sussex.

Joseph E. Stiglitz was awarded the Nobel Prize in economics in 2001 and is University Professor at Columbia University where he founded the Initiative for Policy Dialogue in 2000. He was Chair of President Bill Clinton's Council of Economic Advisors from 1995-97 and Chief Economist and Senior Vice-President of the World Bank from 1997-2000. He is also chair of the University of Manchester's Brooks World Poverty Institute and is a member of the Pontifical Academy of Social Sciences. His best known recent publications include 'Making Globalization Work' (2006), 'Fair Trade for All' (2005), 'Globalization and its Discontents' (2002) and 'The Roaring Nineties' (2003).