How China Escaped the Poverty Trap (eBook)

<p><b>WINNER OF THE 2017 PETER KATZENSTEIN BOOK PRIZE"e;BEST OF BOOKS IN 2017"e; BY FOREIGN AFFAIRSWINNER OF THE 2018 VIVIAN ZELIZER PRIZE BEST BOOK AWARD IN ECONOMIC SOCIOLOGY</b>"e;<i><b>How China Escaped the Poverty Trap</b></i> truly offers game-changing ideas for the analysis and implementation of socio-economic development and should have a major impact across many social sciences."e; Zelizer Best Book in Economic Sociology Prize Committee</p><p>Acclaimed as "e;game changing"e; and "e;field shifting,"e; <b><i>How China Escaped the Poverty Trap</i> </b>advances a new paradigm in the political economy of development and sheds new light on China&#39;s rise.</p><p>How can poor and weak societies escape poverty traps? Political economists have traditionally offered three answers: "e;stimulate growth first,"e; "e;build good institutions first,"e; or "e;some fortunate nations inherited good institutions that led to growth."e;</p><p>Yuen Yuen Ang rejects all three schools of thought and their underlying assumptions: linear causation, a mechanistic worldview, and historical determinism. Instead, she launches a new paradigm grounded in complex adaptive systems, which embraces the reality of interdependence and humanity&#39;s capacity to innovate.</p><p>Combining this original lens with more than 400 interviews with Chinese bureaucrats and entrepreneurs, Ang systematically reenacts the complex process that turned China from a communist backwater into a global juggernaut in just 35 years. Contrary to popular misconceptions, she shows that what drove China&#39;s great transformation was not centralized authoritarian control, but "e;directed improvisation"e;&mdash;top-down directions from Beijing paired with bottom-up improvisation among local officials.</p><p>Her analysis reveals two broad lessons on development. First, transformative change requires an adaptive governing system that empowers ground-level actors to create new solutions for evolving problems. Second, the first step out of the poverty trap is to "e;use what you have"e;&mdash;harnessing existing resources to kick-start new markets, even if that means defying first-world norms.</p><p>Bold and meticulously researched, <b><i>How China Escaped the Poverty Trap</i> </b>opens up a whole new avenue of thinking for scholars, practitioners, and anyone seeking to build adaptive systems.</p>