Economic Trends and Public Policy in East Asia: Implications for the African Region

Abstract

This paper is about economic trends and public policy in selected East Asian countries of Japan, South Korea and Taiwan. It points out that in the early phase of economic development, the three countries intervened in their economies in order to establish sectoral priorities and mobilize resources to hasten economic growth. The intervention did not imply dirigist planning system, but simply meant mapping out a general field where market forces could play. The paper uses import substitution industrialization strategy as a typical example. The implementation was brief after which these countries switched over to intermediate and capital goods manufacturing industries with export drive of locally manufactured commodities. The paper concludes that many developing countries, including African countries, adopted the strategy but its implementation was outstretched, leading to disappointing effects.