Developmental States: A Review of the Literature

Abstract

This paper conducts a review of the literature concerning developmental states, in order to identify gaps and suggest research questions which could be fruitful for the Effective States and Inclusive Development Research Consortium to explore, within the remit of their proposed research programme. This literature review attends to three key questions about developmental states and the answers proposed to them within the literature, namely; what worked? Why did it work? And would it work elsewhere? It also examines an emerging literature suggesting other models of a developmental state more suited to contemporary circumstances, which focus more explicitly on development as a social phenomenon rather than as a purely economic one. These are of particular interest given ESIDs focus on inclusive development.The conclusions of the paper examine some of the gaps in the literature and suggest an agenda for future research which includes addressing questions around:How does the consensus of conducting developmental roles come about -and how is it sustained? Patrimonialism, personal rule, development and stability Role of education, especially higher/further education Importance of rural/agriculture policies

The Politics of Inclusive Development

“…This focus has strong echoes of recent work on state-business relations (e.g. Sen and te Velde 2009) and of earlier work on the 'embedded autonomy' of developmental states (Evans 1995;Routley 2012;vom Hau 2012), including the focus on whether patron-client politics tend to be predatory as opposed to productive in particular contexts. Even within clientelistic political settlements, the presence of a political leadership with long-term time horizons, in alliance with centralized control over rent-seeking, can enable patrimonial settlements to be developmental, whereas a tendency towards decentralized rent-seeking and short-term exigencies within the political settlement is likely to be predatory and unproductive (Kelsall et al 2010).…”

“…Centred mainly on the post-war success stories of South East and East Asia, and to some extent Latin America, the generic lessons have tended to focus on the role of highly competent and committed bureaucrats and political leaders with the capacity to deliver certain public goods, to work closely with and to discipline capital on the basis of its 'embedded autonomy', and to place limits on the potentially fragmentary demands of disparate social groups. Contextual factors have also emerged as significant, as with the threat of violence and disorder from either within or without (Henley 2014;Routley 2012). More recently, the field has moved to examine some of these features in more depth, as with the role of state-business relations in shaping economic policy (Sen 2012), and both intra-elite and elite-mass relations (Vu 2007).…”

Chile's Export Diversification since 1960: A Free Market Miracle or Mirage?

“…For broader reviews of the developmental state approach and debates, see Haggard (ibid. ), Henderson (1993), Leftwich (1995), Moon and Prasad (1997),Öniş(1991), Routley (2012) and Woo-Cumings (1999).…”

Squeezing the State: Tariff Revenue, State Capacity and the WTO's Doha Round

“…The concept of the 'developmental state' drew from the experiences of the countries of Asia that have achieved sustained, broad-based high growth rates (for an excellent literature review, see Routley 2012). These countries were able to form a virtuous circle of mobilising state resources to facilitate economic expansion, which in turn fed through to increased state resources.…”