The developmental state, high-value added activities and gradual liberalization as foundations for economic development: "recalling and analyzing the Anglo-American developmental dynamic to guide the role of the state and markets in achieving sustained economic growth in developing countries"

Abstract

Today, globalized mainstream development theories gravitate around the concepts that Adam Smith and David Ricardo introduced more than two hundred years ago. Nonetheless, both economists' ideas were not always as relevant and appreciated as today, especially in the developed world. Before the complex polarizing dichotomy between right and left ideologies, there seemed to be a strong consensus about the right path towards economic development based on concepts that largely contradict free-market ideals. Historical evidence shows that today's developed nations disregarded much of Smith's and Ricardo's theories and followed the ideas of forgotten developmental economists such as Antonio Serra,