Growth and Equity via Austerity and Competitiveness

Abstract

In the first section of this article, a comparative analysis is undertaken of Latin America and semi-industrialized countries in other areas of the world. Attention is drawn to the specific features of Latin America as regards its lack of a strong predisposition toward the incorporation of technological progress and its dubious achievements in relation to growth, equity, and competitiveness. In the second section, a similar type of comparative analysis is applied to the leading countries. Finally, some reflections are presented with regard to directions and actions in Latin America and in the north that could contribute to confronting what in the first section is defined as the challenge of Latin America, that is, to approaching the until now empty box wherein growth converges with equity.

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References

C. Freeman , J. Clark , and L. Soete , Unemployment and Technical Innovation: A Study of Long Waves and Economic Development (London: Frances Pinter, 1982).

2. See “Aims and Organization of an International Seminar on Sciences Technology and Economic Growth” (Seminar to be held in Paris, June 1989) (Programme of Work of the Committee for Scientific and Technological Policy, Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development [OECD], 1988).

See “National Programmes to Promote Industrial Diffusion of New Technologies” (Synthesis report, OECD, 1987).

4. Countries under consideration are those for which the World Bank gives information on growth and income distribution. The gross national product and the population of that group reaches 80 percent of the total developing countries, Latin American countries excluded. Taiwan accomplished both aims but is not included in the World Bank figures. China—for which the World Bank gives no information on income distribution—is included because, as indicated in other sources, distribution would be, at least, more favorable than that of India. See L. Emmerij , ed., Development Policies and the Crisis of the 1980's (Paris: OECD, 1987), pt. 4, “Asian Countries.”

5. The hypotheses that the two samples are similar has been rejected, for almost all variables, with a probability higher than 95 percent. Only for the difference in the export coefficient, the lower limit is 75 percent. For agricultural share in GDP and for GDP per capita, the two samples are similar, as shown by a T test. See R.G.D. Steel and J. H. Torrie , Principles and Procedures of Statistics, 2d ed. (New York: McGraw-Hill, 1980).

6. A. Hirschman , “The Political Economy of Latin American Development: Seven Exercises in Retrospection” (Paper delivered at the International Congress of the Latin American Studies Association, Boston, Oct. 1986).

7. See Economist, 22 Aug. 1987.

George C. Lodge and Ezra Vogel , eds., Ideology and National Competitiveness: An Analysis of Nine Countries (Boston: Harvard Business School, 1987).