World Economic Performance: Past, Present and Future

World economic performance over the last 50 years has been spectacular. The postwar period has witnessed impressive growth rates in Western Europe and Japan, and in recent times China and India. This new book discusses these issues and tackles topical questions such as; what are the socio-economic and institutional factors that have contributed to this impressive performance? Will China and India continue to grow at the same rate over the next two decades? What are the prospects for Japan, the US and other advanced economies? The book brings together contributions by eminent scholars including the late Angus Maddison, Professors Justin Lin, Bob Gordon, Ross Garnaut, Bart van Ark and others to provide answers to these fascinating questions. The chapters analyse the economic performance of selected countries including China, India, Japan, Indonesia and the US, as well as Western Europe, Latin America and developing countries as a group. The time period of the study is from 1850 to the present and includes forecasts to 2030. This well-documented book will be of considerable interest to development economists and country specialists working on countries such as China and India, economic historians who are interested in explaining the growth performance of countries, economists and economic statisticians who are interested in the measurement issues, and international organizations such as the OECD, World Bank and the UN. General readers and non-specialists who are interested in the world economic performance will also find much to interest them in this book. Contributors include: D. Blades, K. Fukao, R. Garnaut, R.J. Gordon, A.A. Hofman, D. Lal, A. Maddison, S. Menshikov, M. O'Mahony, D.S.P. Rao, O. Saito, A. Szirmai, M.P. Timmer, B. van Ark, P. van der Eng, F. Villarreal, H.X. Wu, J. Yifu Lin

Table of Contents:
Contents: 1. Introduction D.S. Prasada Rao and Bart van Ark 2. Six Transformations in China: 960–2030 Angus Maddison 3. The Needham Puzzle, the Weber Question and China’s Miracle: Long Term Performance since the Sung Dynasty Justin Yifu Lin 4. An Indian Miracle? Deepak Lal 5. Analysis of Russian Performance since 1990 and Future Outlook Stanislav Menshikov 6. Japan’s Alternating Phases of Growth and Future Outlook Kyoji Fukao and Osamu Saito 7. Making the International System Work for the Platinum Age Ross Garnaut 8. Total Factor Productivity and Economic Growth in Indonesia Pierre van der Eng 9. Explaining Success and Failure in Economic Development Adam Szirmai 10. Past, Present and Future Economic Growth in Latin America André A. Hofman and Francisco Villarreal 11. Europe’s Productivity Performance in Comparative Perspective: Trends, Causes and Projections Bart van Ark, Mary O’Mahony and Marcel P. Timmer 12. Revisiting US Productivity Growth over the Past Century with a View of the Future Robert J. Gordon Epilogue: Life and Work of Angus Maddison Confessions of a Chiffrephile Angus Maddison Research Objectives and Results, 1952–2002 Angus Maddison A Story Behind Each Number – Angus Maddison (1926–2010) Derek Blades, Bart van Ark and Harry X. Wu Index

About the Author :
Edited by D.S. Prasada Rao, Professor and Australian Research Council Professorial Fellow, School of Economics, The University of Queensland, Brisbane, Australia and Bart van Ark, Chief Economist of the Conference Board, US and Professor, University of Groningen, The Netherlands

Review :
‘All in all, this extensive volume reads well, is thought provoking, and will stimulate further research. Angus would be certainly proud. I can only recommend you to rush to your library and get a copy before someone else does. You will not regret it!’ ‘Not only is this excellent collection of papers a fitting tribute to Angus Maddison, it is also a great resource for thinking about future patterns of global economic growth - both in the BRICS and the OECD - based on key insights from historical experience.’ ‘Angus Maddison may no longer be with us, but his spirit is very much alive. This collection of essays - including one by Maddison himself - shows how the methods he pioneered continue to shed new light on the comparative performance of nations and inspire successive generations of scholars.’ ‘The distinguished editors, leading authorities in the field of comparative quantitative economic development, have gathered a stellar group of authors to address arguably the most challenging question of our time: understanding development dynamics over time and across countries. They are to be congratulated for this comprehensive, stimulating and insightful volume. It is a fitting tribute to the late Angus Maddison, an intellectual giant in the study of long-term economic development, to whom the book is dedicated.’