Development economics expert Ha-Joon Chang dispels the myths and prejudices that have come to dominate our understanding of how the world works.
Bio
Ha-Joon Chang
Ha-Joon Chang is a professor in the faculty of politics and economics at Cambridge University.
Ha-Joon Chang has taught at the Faculty of Economics and Politics, University of Cambridge, since 1990. In addition to numerous articles in journals and edited volumes, he has published seven authored books (three of them co-authored) and eight edited books (six of them co-edited). His most recent books include Kicking Away the Ladder - Development Strategy in Historical Perspective (2002), which won the 2003 Myrdal Prize, Restructuring Korea Inc. (with Jang-Sup Shin, 2003), Globalization, Economic Development and The Role of the State (2003), and Reclaiming Development - An Alternative Economic Policy Manual (with Ilene Grabel, 2004). His writings have been translated into 13 languages.
Ha-Joon Chang has worked as a consultant for many international organizations, including various UN agencies such as UNDP (United Nations Development Program) and UNCTAD (United Nations Conference on Trade and Development), the World Bank, the Asian Development Bank, and a number of governments on development policies. He was awarded the 2005 Wassily Leontief Prize for Advancing the Frontiers of Economic Thought.
Economic system in which most of the means of production are privately owned, and production is guided and income distributed largely through the operation of markets. Capitalism has been dominant in the Western world since the end of mercantilism. It was fostered by the Reformation, which sanctioned hard work and frugality, and by the rise of industry during the Industrial Revolution, especially the English textile industry (16th–18th centuries). Unlike earlier systems, capitalism used the excess of production over consumption to enlarge productive capacity rather than investing it in economically unproductive enterprises such as palaces or cathedrals. The strong national states of the mercantilist era provided the social conditions, such as uniform monetary systems and legal codes, necessary for the rise of capitalism. The ideology of classical capitalism was expressed in Adam Smith's Wealth of Nations (1776), and Smith's free-market theories were widely adopted in the 19th century. In the 20th century the Great Depression effectively ended laissez-faire economics in most countries, but the demise of the state-run command economies of eastern Europe and the former Soviet Union (seecommunism) and the adoption of some free-market principles in China left capitalism unrivaled (if not untroubled) by the beginning of the 21st century.
Looking back in Time gives a level of knowledge, not available, most times,to us in the present moment. Greed was not addressed, only slightly through cild labor which now are child soldiers.Ethics morality is dropped in a greed for short term profit free mkt system. The taxpayer bailed out wall street and wall street took the money and ran, 42,500 factories with 500 or more employees have left the USA in the last 10 years, raising the unemployment rate to 20 percent. Free Mkt is pushing for ONE WORLD GOVT, one world monetary system, The distance between rich and poor is irrepariably vast, slavery is on the horizon.
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