System, Convergence, and Human Development -- Reflections on Regional Development and the Western Development Strategy

Author: Cai Fang et al.
Publisher:
Publish Date: 2003-01-01
Features: China is the world's largest developing country. Its fundamental national conditions are a large population, vast territory, and significant regional disparities, making it the country with the widest regional differences in the world. Since the reform, China has entered the stage of economic take-off, continuously narrowing the development gap with developed countries. However, the disparity in economic growth rates among its regions has been widening significantly, becoming a widely issue both domestically and internationally. Understanding the characteristics of China's regional development gap, recognizing the differences in regional economic growth and their sources, i.e., solving the mystery of regional development gaps, holds great theoretical and practical significance. In this regard, Cai Fang et al.'s Institutions, Convergence, and Human Development—Regional Development and Western Development Strategy Thinking (China Renmin University Press, 2002) offers a valuable, in-depth, and systematic exploration, providing crucial new development ideas and policy recommendations for Western development, making it a highly distinctive monograph in the field of regional development research. Traditional development theory holds that capital accumulation is the key to economic growth. Based on this understanding, many development policies aimed at narrowing regional disparities have focused on increasing the capital accumulation levels of impoverished regions. However, most governments' regional development strategies have failed to successfully reduce regional disparities. This book reflects on past regional policies, revealing deeper causes of development and underdevelopment through theoretical and empirical analysis. It highlights that the long-term trap of poverty in impoverished regions, apart from gaps in per capita income, investment levels, and efficiency compared to developed regions, is more significantly attributed to a range of human development conditions. These human development conditions include the endowment of human capital in education and health levels, resource and environmental conditions, the development level of product and production factor markets, and other institutional factors. The book suggests that the ongoing Western development strategy should focus on improving the human development conditions in central and western regions, eliminating their poverty in economic development capacity.