Small is Still Beautiful
Small is Still Beautiful

Author: Joseph Pearce

Publisher: Simon and Schuster

Published: 2023-10-17

Total Pages: 182

ISBN-13: 1684516854

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A third of a century ago, E. F. Schumacher rang out a timely warning against the idolatry of giantism with his book Small Is Beautiful. Schumacher, a highly respected economist and adviser to third-world governments, broke ranks with the accepted wisdom of his peers to warn of impending calamity if rampant consumerism, technological dynamism, and economic expansionism were not checked by human and environmental considerations. Joseph Pearce revisits Schumacher’s arguments and examines the multifarious ways in which Schumacher’s ideas themselves still matter. Faced though we are with fearful new technological possibilities and the continued centralization of power in large governmental and economic structures, there is still the possibility of pursuing a saner and more sustainable vision for humanity. Bigger is not always best, Pearce reminds us, and small is still beautiful. Humanity was lurching blindly in the wrong direction, argued Schumacher. Its obsessive pursuit of wealth would not, as so many believed, ultimately lead to utopia but more probably to catastrophe. Schumacher's greatest achievement was the fusion of ancient wisdom and modern economics in a language that encapsulated contemporary doubts and fears about the industrialized world. The wisdom of the ages, the perennial truths that have guided humanity throughout its history, serves as a constant reminder to each new generation of the limits to human ambition. But if this wisdom is a warning, it is also a battle cry. Schumacher saw that we needed to relearn the beauty of smallness, of human-scale technology and environments.

General Purpose Technologies and Economic Growth
General Purpose Technologies and Economic Growth

Author: Elhanan Helpman

Publisher: MIT Press

Published: 1998

Total Pages: 348

ISBN-13: 9780262082631

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Traditionally, economists have considered the accumulation of conventional inputs such as labour and capital to be the primary force behind economic growth. In the late-1990s however, many economists place technological progress at the centre of the growth process. This shift is due to theoretical developments that allow researchers to link microeconomic outcomes.

Is War Necessary for Economic Growth?
Is War Necessary for Economic Growth?

Author: Vernon W. Ruttan

Publisher: Oxford University Press

Published: 2006-01-05

Total Pages: 232

ISBN-13: 0198040652

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Military and defense-related procurement has been an important source of technology development across a broad spectrum of industries that account for an important share of United States industrial production. In this book, the author focuses on six general-purpose technologies: interchangeable parts and mass production; military and commercial aircraft; nuclear energy and electric power; computers and semiconductors; the INTERNET; and the space industries. In each of these industries, technology development would have occurred more slowly, and in some case much more slowly or not at all, in the absence of military and defense-related procurement. The book addresses three questions that have significant implications for the future growth of the United States economy. One is whether changes in the structure of the United States economy and of the defense-industrial base preclude military and defense-related procurement from playing the role in the development of advanced technology in the future, comparable to the role it has played in the past. A second question is whether public support for commercially oriented research and development will become an important source of new general-purpose technologies. A third and more disturbing question is whether a major war, or the threat of major war, will be necessary to mobilize the scientific, technical, and financial resources necessary to induce the development of new general-purpose technologies. When the history of United States technology development in the next half century is written, it will focus on incremental rather than revolutionary changes in both military and commercial technology. It will also be written within the context of slower productivity growth than of the relatively high rates that prevailed in the United States in the 1950s and 1960s or during the information technology bubble that began in the early 1990s. These will impose severe constraints on the capacity of the United States to sustain a global-class military posture and a position of leadership in the global economy.

Technology and the Pursuit of Economic Growth
Technology and the Pursuit of Economic Growth

Author: David C. Mowery

Publisher: Cambridge University Press

Published: 1991-07-26

Total Pages: 344

ISBN-13: 9780521389365

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Technology's contribution to economic growth and competitiveness has been the subject of vigorous debate in recent years. This book demonstrates the importance of a historical perspective in understanding the role of technological innovation in the economy. The authors examine key episodes and institutions in the development of the U.S. research system and in the development of the research systems of other industrial economies. They argue that the large potential contributions of economics to the understanding of technology and economic growth have been constrained by the narrow theoretical framework employed within neoclassical economies. A richer framework, they believe, will support a more fruitful dialogue among economists, policymakers, and managers on the organization of public and private institutions for innovation. David Mowery is Associate Professor of Business and Public Policy at the School of Business Administration, University of California, Berkeley. Nathan S. Rosenberg is Fairleigh Dickinson Professor of Economics at Stanford University. He is the author of Inside the Black Box: Technology and Economics (CUP, 1983).

Information Technologies and Economic Development in Latin America
Information Technologies and Economic Development in Latin America

Author: Alberto Chong

Publisher: Anthem Press

Published: 2020-02-29

Total Pages: 224

ISBN-13: 1785272004

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Information Technologies and Economic Development in Latin America provides a collection of rigorous empirical studies that contributes to a better understanding of the role and impact of old and new information technologies on Latin American economic development. It provides evidence using randomized and quasi-experimental designed studies for different information and communication technologies interventions. In evaluating their development impact a critical concern has been to contribute to the little existing evidence. In fact, whereas many ICT projects in the developing world have been promoted by multilateral organizations, bilateral aid agencies and nongovernmental organizations in recent years, the extent to which these interventions and policies actually contribute to the development of the region is unclear. The book provides evidence on what works and what does not.

Technology, Institutions, and Economic Growth
Technology, Institutions, and Economic Growth

Author: Richard R. Nelson

Publisher: Harvard University Press

Published: 2005-12-30

Total Pages: 326

ISBN-13: 9780674019164

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"In this book Richard R. Nelson mounts a full-blown attack on the standard neoclassical theory of economic growth, which he sees as hopelessly inadequate to explain the phenomenon. His alterative theory posits that economic growth driven by technological advance involves disequilibrium in a fundamental and continuing way. Nelson argues that an adequate theory must take into account a range of institutions, from universities to public laboratories and from government agencies to business firms and markets."--BOOK JACKET.

Mastering a New Role
Mastering a New Role

Author: National Academy of Engineering

Publisher: National Academies Press

Published: 1993-02-01

Total Pages: 145

ISBN-13: 0309046467

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This book examines the changing character of commercial technology development and diffusion in an integrated global economy and its implications for U.S. public policies in support of technological innovation. The volume considers the history, current practice, and future prospects for national policies to encourage economic development through both direct and indirect government support of technological advance.

Entrepreneurship and Economic Development
Entrepreneurship and Economic Development

Author: Wim Naudé

Publisher: Springer

Published: 2010-12-08

Total Pages: 384

ISBN-13: 0230295150

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Leading international scholars provide a timely reconsideration of how and why entrepreneurship matters for economic development, particularly in emerging and developing economies. The book critically dissects the evolving relationship between entrepreneurs and the state.

The Theory of Technological Change and Economic Growth
The Theory of Technological Change and Economic Growth

Author: Dr Stanislaw Gomulka

Publisher: Routledge

Published: 2006-12-05

Total Pages: 272

ISBN-13: 113494070X

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In this wide ranging exposition of the various economic theories of technological change, Stanislaw Gomulka relates them to rates of growth experienced by different economies in both the short and the long term. Analysis of countries as diverse as Japan, the Soviet Union and the United Kingdom demonstrates that there is an interdependence between technological change and the institutional and cultural characteristics of different countries, which can have a profound effect on their rates of growth. All of the major, relevant models are discussed, including those of Kuznets and Phelps, but throughout the emphasis is on the creation of a unified theoretical framework to help explain the impact of technological progress on both a micro and a macro scale.