IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/ehl/lserod/127350.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

CEPAL and ISI: reconsidering the debates, policies and outcomes

Author

Listed:
  • Lewis, Colin M.

Abstract

Reappraising cepalina import-substituting industrialisation (ISI) means exploring strategies associated with diagnoses and policy prescriptions, recognising that ideas and processes changed over time, that there was divergence between original diagnoses of development problems and policy interventions designed to resolve them, and that some strategies and outcomes attributed to ECLA were distant from original propositions. Section one locates the ECLA project within a stylised chronology. The second focusses on two sub-periods: (i) proto-cepalismo; (ii) the classic phase of cepalismo. The third re-evaluates the project, challenging contemporary and current opinions. The main findings emphasise continuities between the two sub-periods, arguing that current vilification of the project by the left and the right is/was myopic. Industrial growth was underway in some economies by/before the end of the nineteenth century; industrialisation may have occurred in some countries before 1940; and what had been achieved by the 1990s in parts of the continent was considerable.

Suggested Citation

  • Lewis, Colin M., 2019. "CEPAL and ISI: reconsidering the debates, policies and outcomes," LSE Research Online Documents on Economics 127350, London School of Economics and Political Science, LSE Library.
    • Handle: RePEc:ehl:lserod:127350
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://eprints.lse.ac.uk/127350/
    File Function: Open access version.
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Thorp, Rosemary, 1998. "Progress, Poverty and Exclusion: An Economic History of Latin America in the 20th Century," IDB Publications (Books), Inter-American Development Bank, number 412.
    2. Rosemary Thorp, 1998. "Progress, Poverty and Exclusion: An Economic History of Latin America in the 20th Century," IDB Publications (Books), Inter-American Development Bank, number 79303, February.
    3. Williamson, Jeffrey G., 2011. "Trade and Poverty: When the Third World Fell Behind," MIT Press Books, The MIT Press, edition 1, volume 1, number 0262015158, December.
    4. André A. Hofman, 2000. "The Economic Development of Latin America in the Twentieth Century," Books, Edward Elgar Publishing, number 1534, March.
    5. Hirschman,Albert O., 1981. "Essays in Trespassing," Cambridge Books, Cambridge University Press, number 9780521282437, June.
    6. Bertola, Luis & Ocampo, Jose Antonio, 2012. "The Economic Development of Latin America since Independence," OUP Catalogue, Oxford University Press, number 9780199662142, Decembrie.
    7. Prebisch, Raúl, 1950. "The economic development of Latin America and its principal problems," Sede de la CEPAL en Santiago (Estudios e Investigaciones) 29973, Naciones Unidas Comisión Económica para América Latina y el Caribe (CEPAL).
    8. Jos� Antonio Ocampo & Juliana Vallejo, 2012. "Economic Growth, Equity and Human Development in Latin America," Journal of Human Development and Capabilities, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 13(1), pages 107-133, February.
    9. Ocampo, Jose Antonio & Ros, Jaime (ed.), 2011. "The Oxford Handbook of Latin American Economics," OUP Catalogue, Oxford University Press, number 9780199571048, Decembrie.
    10. Jeffrey G. Williamson, 2011. "Trade and Poverty: When the Third World Fell Behind," MIT Press Books, The MIT Press, edition 1, volume 1, number 0262015153, December.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Leticia Arroyo Abad & Pablo Astorga Junquera, 2017. "Latin American earnings inequality in the long run," Cliometrica, Springer;Cliometric Society (Association Francaise de Cliométrie), vol. 11(3), pages 349-374, September.
    2. Mario Cimoli & Gabriel Porcile & Antonio Martins Neto & Fernando Sossdorf, 2017. "Productivity, social expenditure and income distribution in Latin America," Brazilian Journal of Political Economy, Center of Political Economy, vol. 37(4), pages 660-679.
    3. Giovanni Federico & Antonio Tena‐Junguito, 2017. "Lewis revisited: tropical polities competing on the world market, 1830–1938," Economic History Review, Economic History Society, vol. 70(4), pages 1244-1267, November.
    4. Zenonas Norkus & Jurgita Markevičiūtė, 2021. "New estimation of the gross domestic product in Baltic countries in 1913–1938," Cliometrica, Springer;Cliometric Society (Association Francaise de Cliométrie), vol. 15(3), pages 565-674, September.
    5. Renato P. Colistete, 2024. "Revisiting Import-Substituting Industrialisation in Post-War Brazil," Working Papers, Department of Economics 2024_36, University of São Paulo (FEA-USP).
    6. Pablo Astorga Junquera, 2017. "Real Wages and Skill Premiums during Economic Development in Latin America," Oxford Economic and Social History Working Papers _153, University of Oxford, Department of Economics.
    7. Prados de la Escosura, Leandro, 2005. "Growth, inequality, and poverty in Latin America: historical evidence, controlled conjectures," IFCS - Working Papers in Economic History.WH wh054104, Universidad Carlos III de Madrid. Instituto Figuerola.
    8. Cemal Eren Arbatli, 2016. "Trade and income growth in the Ottoman Empire: assessing the role of volatility and trend growth in terms of trade," Eurasian Economic Review, Springer;Eurasia Business and Economics Society, vol. 6(2), pages 173-194, August.
    9. Jeffrey G. Williamson, 2010. "When, Where, and Why? Early Industrialization in the Poor Periphery 1870-1940," NBER Working Papers 16344, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    10. Jeffrey G. Williamson, 2011. "Industrial Catching Up in the Poor Periphery 1870-1975," NBER Working Papers 16809, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    11. Joseph A. Francis, 2015. "The Periphery's Terms of Trade in the Nineteenth Century: A Methodological Problem Revisited," Historical Methods: A Journal of Quantitative and Interdisciplinary History, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 48(1), pages 52-65, March.
    12. Laura Panza & Jeffrey G. Williamson, 2017. "Australian Squatters, Convicts, and Capitalists: Dividing Up a Fast-Growing Frontier Pie 1821-1871," NBER Working Papers 23416, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    13. Danilo Spinola, 2021. "The La Marca model revisited: Structuralist goodwin cycles with evolutionary supply side and balance of payments constraints," Metroeconomica, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 72(1), pages 189-212, February.
    14. Javier Rodríguez Weber, 2015. "Income inequality in Chile since 1850," Documentos de trabajo 36, Programa de Historia Económica, FCS, Udelar.
    15. Williamson, Jeffrey G., 2011. "Industrial Catching Up in the Poor Periphery 1870-1975," CEPR Discussion Papers 8335, C.E.P.R. Discussion Papers.
    16. Williamson, Jeffrey G., 2017. "Philippine Inequality across the Twentieth Century: Slim Evidence but Fat Questions," CEPR Discussion Papers 12481, C.E.P.R. Discussion Papers.
    17. Pablo Astorga, 2015. "Functional Inequality in Latin America: News from the Twentieth Century," Oxford Economic and Social History Working Papers _135, University of Oxford, Department of Economics.
    18. Williamson, Jeffrey G., 2013. "The Commodity Export, Growth, and Distribution Connection in Southeast Asia 1500-1940," CEPR Discussion Papers 9364, C.E.P.R. Discussion Papers.
    19. Emilia Ormaechea, 2024. "Latin American Neostructuralism and Its Differentiation from Latin American Structuralism," Review of Radical Political Economics, Union for Radical Political Economics, vol. 56(3), pages 337-354, September.
    20. Ewout Frankema & Jeffrey Williamson & Pieter Woltjer, 2015. "An Economic Rationale for the African Scramble: The Commercial Transition and the Commodity Price Boom of 1845-1885," NBER Working Papers 21213, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    development; industry; policy; state intervention;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • O14 - Economic Development, Innovation, Technological Change, and Growth - - Economic Development - - - Industrialization; Manufacturing and Service Industries; Choice of Technology
    • N16 - Economic History - - Macroeconomics and Monetary Economics; Industrial Structure; Growth; Fluctuations - - - Latin America; Caribbean
    • L52 - Industrial Organization - - Regulation and Industrial Policy - - - Industrial Policy; Sectoral Planning Methods

    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:ehl:lserod:127350. 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.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with 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: LSERO Manager (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/lsepsuk.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.