Globalization and Competition: Why Some Emergent Countries Succeed while Others Fall Behind

Globalization and Competition explains why some middle-income countries, principally those in Asia, grow fast while others are not successful. The author criticizes both old-style developmentalism and the economics of the Washington Consensus. He argues instead for a "new developmentalism" or third approach that builds on a national development strategy. This approach differs from the neoliberal strategy that rich nations propose to emerging economies principally on macroeconomic grounds. Developing countries face a key obstacle to growth, namely, the tendency to overvaluate foreign exchange. Instead of neutralizing it, the policy that rich countries promote mistakenly seeks growth through foreign savings, which causes additional appreciation of the national currency and often results in financial crises rather than genuine investment.

Luiz Carlos Bresser Pereira has taught economics and political theory at the Getulio Vargas Foundation, So Paulo, Brazil, since 1962. More recently, he has also taught at the cole des Hautes tudes en Sciences Sociales in Paris. His works in English include Development and Crisis in Brazil (1984), The Theory of Inertial Inflation (1987), Economic Reforms in New Democracies (Cambridge University Press, 1993, with Jose Maria Maravall and Adam Przeworski), Democracy and Public Management Reform (2004), and Developing Brazil (2009).