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Voluminous, Repetitive, and IntractableSamuelson on Early Development Economics

Voluminous, Repetitive, and IntractableSamuelson on Early Development Economics In the late 1970s Paul Samuelson drafted the outline of a paper, never published, with a critical assessment of the theoretical innovations of postwar development economics. He found it a “vital” but essentially “not tractable” subject, with a “voluminous” and “repetitive” literature. This article discusses how that assessment fits in Samuelson’s published writings on economic development, throughout several editions of his textbook Economics, and in papers he wrote before and after that assessment. Increasing returns posed a main analytical hurdle, together with the elusive attempt to provide “laws of motion” of economic development. Samuelson’s notion of “tractability” may be traced back to Peter Medawar’s well-known definition of science as the “art of the soluble.” http://www.deepdyve.com/assets/images/DeepDyve-Logo-lg.png History of Political Economy Duke University Press

Voluminous, Repetitive, and IntractableSamuelson on Early Development Economics

History of Political Economy , Volume 54 (1) – Feb 1, 2022

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Copyright
Copyright © 2022 Duke University Press
ISSN
0018-2702
eISSN
1527-1919
DOI
10.1215/00182702-9548316
Publisher site
See Article on Publisher Site

Abstract

In the late 1970s Paul Samuelson drafted the outline of a paper, never published, with a critical assessment of the theoretical innovations of postwar development economics. He found it a “vital” but essentially “not tractable” subject, with a “voluminous” and “repetitive” literature. This article discusses how that assessment fits in Samuelson’s published writings on economic development, throughout several editions of his textbook Economics, and in papers he wrote before and after that assessment. Increasing returns posed a main analytical hurdle, together with the elusive attempt to provide “laws of motion” of economic development. Samuelson’s notion of “tractability” may be traced back to Peter Medawar’s well-known definition of science as the “art of the soluble.”

Journal

History of Political EconomyDuke University Press

Published: Feb 1, 2022

References