Growth Diagnostics: Strengths and Weaknesses of a Creative Analytical Framework to Identify Economic Growth Constraints in Developing Countries

This paper discusses the Growth Diagnostics approach developed by Hausmann, Rodrik and Velasco. The approach suggests an analytical framework to identify the most binding constraints that hamper economic growth in a specific country at a specific point in time. Aiming at higher-order principles of neoclassical economics, Growth Diagnostics allows policymakers to creatively develop policy designs which address the most binding constraint while taking into account relevant factors of their country’s economic, political and social context. Most importantly, it considers both orthodox and heterodox policies as possible solutions to ignite growth. Against the backdrop of changing economic policy advice from the big push idea to the augmented Washington Consensus, the authors analyze the reasoning behind the Growth Diagnostics approach. Criticisms by academics and practitioners serve as a basis for a discussion on the approach’s possible shortcomings. The authors conclude that Growth Diagnostics is a useful tool to inform growth strategies in developing countries, whereas the new framework’s flexibility is discerned as both its essential strength and its main weakness. Among the approach’s most important contributions are its explicit renunciation of economic rules of thumb in favor of fact-based diagnosis and context-specific policy design, its ability to identify reform priorities based on expected impact as well as its caution with respect to potentially adverse second-best interactions between different policy reforms.