IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/oup/wbrobs/v22y2007i2p131-157.html

Evaluating Recipes for Development Success

Author

Listed:
  • Avinash Dixit

Abstract

This article offers a provocative critique of the ability of research on the impact of institutions on growth to offer immediate and practical recommendations for reforming and redesigning institutions in developing countries and transition economies. The literature traces the sources of growth to unalterable historical and geographic features. It contains equally plausible recommendations for opposite courses of action. It is sometimes driven by fads or recommends imitation of the latest success story. Some recommendations are too vague or too general to constitute practical advice. The article suggests a Bayesian diagnostic procedure to identify the causes of economic failure in an individual country as a first step toward remedying the failure. Copyright The Author 2007. Published by Oxford University Press on behalf of the International Bank for Reconstruction and Development / the world bank . All rights reserved. For permissions, please e-mail: journals.permissions@oxfordjournals.org, Oxford University Press.

Suggested Citation

  • Avinash Dixit, 2007. "Evaluating Recipes for Development Success," The World Bank Research Observer, World Bank, vol. 22(2), pages 131-157, June.
    • Handle: RePEc:oup:wbrobs:v:22:y:2007:i:2:p:131-157
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://hdl.handle.net/10.1093/wbro/lkm005
    Download Restriction: Access to full text is restricted to subscribers.
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to look for a different version below or

    for a different version of it.

    Other versions of this item:

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Jack, William & Lewis, Maureen, 2009. "Health investments and economic growth : macroeconomic evidence and microeconomic foundations," Policy Research Working Paper Series 4877, The World Bank.
    2. Mercedes Delgado & Christian Ketels & Michael E. Porter & Scott Stern, 2012. "The Determinants of National Competitiveness," NBER Working Papers 18249, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    3. Arbache, Jorge & Go, Delfin S. & Page, John, 2008. "Is Africa's economy at a turning point?," Policy Research Working Paper Series 4519, The World Bank.
    4. Shahrukh Khan, 2013. "The military and economic development in Pakistan," Chapters, in: Jeannette Wicks-Lim & Robert Pollin (ed.), Capitalism on Trial, chapter 4, Edward Elgar Publishing.
    5. World Bank, 2012. "Liberia : Inclusive Growth Diagnostics," World Bank Publications - Reports 12609, The World Bank Group.
    6. Carmen Camacho & Hannes Tepper, 2025. "Do this or do that? A model to prioritize reforms," PSE Working Papers halshs-04005785, HAL.
    7. Thanh Thuy Vu & Messaoud Zouikri & Bruno Deffains, 2014. "The Interrelationship between Formal and Informal Decentralization and Its Impact on Subcentral Governance Performance: the Case of Vietnam," CESifo Economic Studies, CESifo Group, vol. 60(3), pages 613-652.
    8. Quibria, M.G. & Islam, Anika, 2014. "Aid Effectiveness in Bangladesh: Development with Governance Challenges," MPRA Paper 63759, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    9. Villarroel-Böhrt, Sergio G., 2019. "Diagnóstico de crecimiento en Bolivia: Una Aplicación a Través de Redes Limitantes," Other publications TiSEM 97b99c6d-b5c7-4646-a415-b, Tilburg University, School of Economics and Management.
    10. William Easterly, 2009. "Can the West Save Africa?," Journal of Economic Literature, American Economic Association, vol. 47(2), pages 373-447, June.
    11. Pedro Castellón Patiño, 2018. "José Agustín Blanco Barros (1922 - 2016) : Un Provinciano Universal," European Journal of Multidisciplinary Studies Articles, Revistia Research and Publishing, vol. 3, ejms_v3_i.
    12. Mujumdar, N.A., 2012. "India’s Development Drama 1991–2011: From Milton Friedman to Mahatma Gandhi," Indian Journal of Agricultural Economics, Indian Society of Agricultural Economics, vol. 67(01), pages 1-18.
    13. Khan Shahrukh Rafi, 2011. "Growth Diagnostics: The Puzzle of Pakistan's Lagging Economic Growth," Global Economy Journal, De Gruyter, vol. 11(4), pages 1-19, December.
    14. World Bank, 2010. "Bhutan Investment Climate Assessment Report : Vitalizing the Private Sector, Creating Jobs, Volume 2," World Bank Publications - Reports 12872, The World Bank Group.
    15. Abbott, Philip & Andersen, Thomas Barnebeck & Tarp, Finn, 2010. "IMF and economic reform in developing countries," The Quarterly Review of Economics and Finance, Elsevier, vol. 50(1), pages 17-26, February.
    16. Florian Misch & Norman Gemmell & Richard Kneller, 2014. "Using surveys of business perceptions as a guide to growth-enhancing fiscal reforms," The Economics of Transition, The European Bank for Reconstruction and Development, vol. 22(4), pages 683-725, October.
    17. Susan Pozo & Jose R. Sánchez-Fung & Amelia U. Santos-Paulino, 2010. "Economic Development Strategies in the Dominican Republic," WIDER Working Paper Series wp-2010-115, World Institute for Development Economic Research (UNU-WIDER).
    18. Javier Leonardo Garay Vargas & Juan Bautista Pavajeau, 2021. "Ideas erradas, acciones equivocadas : cómo el contexto internacional impide la generación de desarrollo," Books, Universidad Externado de Colombia, Facultad de Finanzas, Gobierno y Relaciones Internacionales, number 151.
    19. Carmen Camacho & Hannes Tepper, 2025. "Do this or do that? A model to prioritize reforms," Working Papers halshs-04005785, HAL.
    20. Naudé, Wim, 2009. "Geography, transport and Africa’s proximity gap," Journal of Transport Geography, Elsevier, vol. 17(1), pages 1-9.
    21. Ho Thuy Ai & Ping, Lin, 2018. "Impacts of fiscal policy on economic growth: Another look from institutional perspective," Economics Discussion Papers 2018-45, Kiel Institute for the World Economy (IfW Kiel).
    22. Ricardo Hausmann & Bailey Klinger & Rodrigo Wagner, 2008. "Doing Growth Diagnostics in Practice: A 'Mindbook'," Growth Lab Working Papers 19, Harvard's Growth Lab.
    23. Berhanu Abegaz, 2011. "Political Parties in Business," Working Papers 113, Economics Department, William & Mary.
    24. World Bank, 2010. "Bhutan Investment Climate Assessment Report : Vitalizing the Private Sector, Creating Jobs, Volume 1. Summary Report," World Bank Publications - Reports 12871, The World Bank Group.

    More about this item

    JEL classification:

    • O43 - Economic Development, Innovation, Technological Change, and Growth - - Economic Growth and Aggregate Productivity - - - Institutions and Growth
    • O29 - Economic Development, Innovation, Technological Change, and Growth - - Development Planning and Policy - - - Other

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:oup:wbrobs:v:22:y:2007:i:2:p:131-157. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    We have no bibliographic references for this item. You can help adding them by using this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Oxford University Press (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/wrldbus.html .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.