The Economics of Take-Off into Sustained Growth

505 Pages·1963·53.628 MB·English

by  Professor W. W. Rostow (eds.)

INTERNATIONAL ECONOMIC ASSOCIATION
CONFERENCE VOLUMES. Numbers 1-50
NUMBER 11
The Economics of Take-Off into
Sustained Growth
THE
ECONOMICS OF TAKE-OFF
INTO
SUSTAINED GROWTH
Proceedings of a Conference
held by the International Economic Association
EDITED BY
W. W. ROSTOW
© International Economic Association 1963
Softcover reprint of the hardcover 1st edition 1963 978-0-333-40639-7
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First published 1963
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Transferred to digital printing 1998
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CONTENTS
PAGE
LIST OF PARTICIPANTS lX
INTRODUCTION AND EPILOGUE. W. W. Rostow xiii
CH1A.P , LEADING SECTORS AND THE TAKE-OFF. W. W. Rostow 1
2. NoTES ON THE TAKE-OFF. S. Kuznets 22
3. INDUSTRIALIZATION IN THE UNITED STATES (1815-60).
44
D. C. North
J.
4. THE TAKE-OFF IN BRITAIN. H. Habakkuk and Phyllis
63
Deane
5. GOVERNMENT ACTIVITY AND INDUSTRIALIZATION IN GER-
MANY (1815-70). W. Fischer 83
6. THE TAKE-OFF IN GERMANY. W. G. Hoffmann 95
J.
7. THE TAKE-OFF HYPOTHESIS AND FRENCH EXPERIENCE,
119
Marczewski
8. THE TAKE-OFF IN jAPAN (1868-1900). S. Tsuru 139
9. THE EARLY PHASES OF INDUSTRIALIZATION IN RusSIA:
AFTERTHOUGHTS AND CouNTERTHOUGHTS. A. Gerschenkron 151
10. PoPULATION GROWTH AND THE TAKE-OFF HYPOTHESIS. H.
170
Leibenstein
11. TECHNICAL PROGRESS, THE PRODUCTION FUNCTION, AND
DEVELOPMENT. H. Leibenstein 185
12. AGRARIAN STRUCTURE AND TAKE-OFF. M. Boserup 201
13. AGRICULTURE AND ECONOMIC DEVELOPMENT. 0. G. de
225
Bulhoes
14. CAPITAL FoRMATION IN THE TAKE-OFF. A. K. Cairncross 240
15. SociAL OVERHEAD CAPITAL AND EcoNOMIC GROWTH. P. H.
261
Cootner
16. FoREIGN CAPITAL AND TAKE-OFF. K. E. Berrill 285
SuMMARY RECORD OF THE DEBATE. D. C. Hague 301
477
INDEX
v
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
The International Economic Association wishes to
thank all those who did much to ensure the success of
the Conference recorded in this volume. Special grati
tude is due to the management and staff of the Inset
Hotel at Konstanz where the Conference was held in a
most beautiful setting. That the weather. was throughout
unkind was no possible fault of theirs.
vii
LIST OF PARTICIPANTS
Dr. 0. Aukrust
Midtasen 55, Ljan, Oslo, Norway
Professor Ragnar Bentzel
Handelshogskolan i Stockholm, Sveavagen 65, Stockholm,
Sweden
Mr. Kenneth Berrill
St. Catharine's College, Cambridge
Dr. H. C. Bos
Netherlands Economic Institute, Pieter de Hoochweg 122,
Rotterdam, Netherlands
Dr. Mogens Boserup
4 Route de Chancy, Geneva, Switzerland
Professor Jacques Boudeville
29 rue Jaimin, Paris 16e, France
Professor Octavia Bulhoes
Brazilian Institute of Economics, Fundayao Getulio Vargas,
Praia de Botafogo 186, Rio de Janeiro, Brazil
Professor A. K. Cairncross
Department of Social and Economic Research, University of
Glasgow, 12 Bute Gardens, Glasgow W.2, U.K.
Professor C. M. Cipolla
Facolta di Economia e Commercia, Istituto Universitario di
Venezia, Ca' Foscari, Venice, Italy
Dr. Paul Cootner
Center for International Studies, Massachusetts Institute of
Technology, SO Memorial Drive, Cambridge 39, Mass.,
U.S.A.
Miss Phyllis Deane
Department of Applied Economics, 7 West Road, Cambridge,
U.K.
Professor Dr. D. Delivanis
50 Jan Smuts, Athens, Greece
Professor Leon Dupriez
Institut de Recherches economiques et sociales, Universite de
Louvain, Place Mgr Ladeuze, Louvain, Belgium
Professor Luc Fauvel
31 his rue Campagne Premiere, Paris 14e, France
A2 lX
The Economics of Take-off into Sustained Growth
Professor Dr. Wolfram Fischer
Sozialforschungsstelle an der Universitat Munster, Rheinland
damm 199, Dortmund, Germany
Professor Alexander Gerschenkron
Department of Economics, Harvard University, M-7 Littauer
Center, Cambridge 38, Mass., U.S.A.
Professor Eugenio Gudin
Rua da Candelaria 19, Rio de Janeiro, Brazil
Professor Gottfried Haberler
326 Littauer Center, Harvard University, Cambridge 38, Mass.,
U.S.A.
Professor Douglas Hague
Department of Economics, The University, Sheffield 10, U.K.
Professor Dr. Walther Hoffmann
Institut fiir Industriewirtschaftliche Forschung der Universitat
Munster, Universitatsstrasse 14-16, Munster, Westf., Ger
many
Professor Emile James
6 avenue de Segur, Paris 7e, France
Professor Dr. W. A. Johr
Goethestrasse 77, St. Gallen, Switzerland
Professor Simon Kuznets
333 Tuscany Road, Baltimore 10, Maryland, U.S.A.
Professor David Landes
Department of History, University of California, Berkeley 4,
California, U.S.A.
Professor Harvey Leibenstein
Department of Economics, University of California, Berkeley 4,
California, U.S.A.
Professor W. A. Lewis
University College of the West Indies, Mona, Kingston 7,
Jamaica, West Indies
Professor Edward Lipinski
Rakowiecka 6 m. 26, Warsaw, Poland
Professor Erik Lundberg
Borjesonsvagen 42, Bromma, Stockholm, Sweden
Professor Jean Marczewski
46 rue de Rennes, Paris 6e, France
Dr. Gautam Mathur
55 Grantchester Street, Cambridge, U.K.
Professor Dr. Fritz Neumark
Gesellschaft fur Wirtschafts- und Sozialwissenschaften, Merton
strasse 17, Frankfurt-am-Main, Germany
X
List of Participants
Professor Douglass C. North
Institute for Economic Research, University of Washington,
Seattle 5, Washington, U.S.A.
Professor E. A. G. Robinson
The Marshall Library, Downing Street, Cambridge, U.K.
Professor W. W. Rostow
Center for International Studies, Massachusetts Institute of
Technology, 50 Memorial Drive, Cambridge 39, Mass.,
U.S.A.
Dr. H. W. Singer
Department of Economic Affairs, United Nations, New York,
N.Y., U.S.A.
Professor Robert Solow
Department of Economics and Social Research, Massachusetts
Institute of Technology, Cambridge 38, Mass., U.S.A.
Professor S. Tsuru
Institute of Economic Research, Hitotsubashi University,
Kunitachi, Tokyo, Japan
Observer
Mrs. G. Podbielski
Research and Planning Division, U.N. Economic Commission
for Europe, Geneva, Switzerland
xi
INTRODUCTION AND EPILOGUE
Bv W. W. ROSTOW
SPEc 1 A L pressures and distractions, at play first on Professor
Hague and then on myself, confront me with the task of writing this
reply to the debate a little more than two years after it took place at
Konstanz. There may be some virtue in this lapse of time. It may
permit a detachment that mitigates the chivalrous irregularity of the
Association's invitation to one contentious participant to provide
an introduction to this book. This procedure was judged at the
time more appropriate than my taking the time of the conference to
reply to Professor Landes' summing up at the ninth session and to
Professor Solow's, at the final session.
I
Re-reading the papers and Professor Hague's summary of the
discussion I believe that in this volume the conference speaks well
for itself. The Association succeeded in bringing together a distin
guished group of historians, specializing on particular nations ;
statisticians ; theorists ; and experts on functional aspects of
growth. They answered, each from his own perspective, the
question : Is the concept of take-off useful, misleading, or wrong ?
In so doing they laid on the table their latest reflections on the pro
cess of economic growth and, either implicitly or explicitly, their
own analytic approaches to the problem. Those contributions are,
evidently, the principal justification for the volume.
As for the take-off, it will have to look after itself. Each reader
will make his own assessment of the debate. Like all intellectual
constructs it will survive only if it meets the hard pragmatic test of
usefulness to others - if it illuminates problems that deeply concern
them. No market is-or should be-more ruthlessly competitive
than the market-place of ideas, even though, as the record of this
conference suggests, it is an oligopolistic market ; that is, the coming
in of a new idea is felt by the other producers to involve a potential
shift in the shape of the demand curve that confronts their own
products, and they react appropriately. As I remarked at one point
in the debate, the introduction of a new concept - especially a new
term - is an act of aggression against respected colleagues and
xiii