Epistemics Of Development Economics

The effective use of development economic theories in practice is limited, the authors contend, by the lack of explicit criterion for judging their scientific content. The directional progress of critical research and teaching is also constrained by this deficiency. This study advances a meta-theory designed to assist in evaluating the scientific validity of theories in economic development and how these theories can be improved to assist social practice. Using this model, the study then examines existing theories, dividing them into explanatory and prescriptive theories. The explanatory theories include the stage-based theories of Marx, Schumpeter, and Rostow, and factor-based theories, including capital-based, human-capital-based, and technology-based theories. The prescriptive theories include explanatory-theory-based prescriptions, interventionist prescriptive theories, and theories of economic planning. In conclusion, the authors contend that modern analysis of development economics is plagued with logical ills, misleading notions, and a weak theoretical structure that lacks scientific appeal. Most of the theories, except for those of Marx and Schumpeter, neglect an analysis of the mechanism of change.

Under what conditions of supply and demand are experts likely to give us good advice? When is expert failure more likely? Do entrepreneurs challenge existing expertise? Are they experts themselves? This title brings a heterogeneous collection of thinkers, some "Austrian" and to engage the problem of experts.

Over the past several decades, as the pace of globalization has accelerated, operational issues of international coordination have often been overlooked. For example, the global financial crisis that began in 2007 is attributed, in part, to a lack of regulatory oversight. As a result, supranational organizations, such as the G-20, the World Bank, and the International Monetary Fund, have prioritized strengthening of the international financial architecture and providing opportunities for dialogue on national policies, international co-operation, and international financial institutions. Prevailing characteristics of the global economic systems, such as the increasing power of financial institutions, changes in the structure of global production, decline in the authority of nation-states over their national economy, and creation of global institutional setting, e.g., global governance have created the conditions for a naturally evolving process towards enabling national epistemic communities to create institutions that comply with global rules and regulations can control crises. In this context, transfer of technical knowledge from the larger organizations and its global epistemic communities to member communities is becoming a policy tool to “convince” participants in the international system to have similar ideas about which rules will govern their mutual participation. In the realm of finance and banking regulation, the primary focus is on transfer of specialized and procedural knowledge in technical domains (such as accounting procedures, payment systems, and corporate governance principles), thereby promoting institutional learning at national and local levels. In this volume, the authors provide in-depth analysis of initiatives to demonstrate how this type of knowledge generated at the international organization level, is codified into global standards, and disseminated to members, particularly in the developing world, where the legal and regulatory infrastructure is often lacking. They argue that despite the challenges, when a country intends to join the global system, its institutions and economic structures need to move toward the global norms. In so doing, they shed new light on the dynamics of knowledge transfer, financial regulation, economic development, with particular respect to supporting global standards and avoiding future crises.

This monograph is a treatment on optimal fuzzy rationality as an enveloping of decision-choice rationalities where limited information, vagueness, ambiguities and inexactness are essential characteristics of our knowledge structure and reasoning processes. The volume is devoted to a unified system of epistemic models and theories of decision-choice behavior under total uncertainties composed of fuzzy and stochastic types. The unified epistemic analysis of decision-choice models and theories begins with the question of how best to integrate vagueness, ambiguities, limited information, subjectivity and approximation into the decision-choice process. The answer to the question leads to the shifting of the classical paradigm of reasoning to fuzzy paradigm. This is followed by discussions and establishment of the epistemic foundations of fuzzy mathematics where the nature and role of information and knowledge are explicated and represented. The epistemic foundation allows total uncertainties that constrain decision-choice activities, knowledge enterprise, logic and mathematical structures as our cognitive instruments to be discussed in reference to the phenomena of fuzzification, defuzzification and fuzzy logic. The discussions on these phenomena lead us to analyze and present models and theories on decision-choice rationality and the needed mathematics for problem formulation, reasoning and computations. The epistemic structures of two number systems made up of classical numbers and fuzzy numbers are discussed in relation to their differences, similarities and relative relevance to decision-choice rationality. The properties of the two number systems lead to the epistemic analysis of two mathematical systems that allow the partition of the mathematical space in support of decision-choice space of knowledge and non-knowledge production into four cognitively separate but interdependent cohorts whose properties are analyzed by the methods and techniques of category theory. The four cohorts are identified as non-fuzzy and non-stochastic, non-fuzzy and stochastic both of which belong to the classical paradigm and classical mathematical space; and fuzzy and non-stochastic, and fuzzy and stochastic cohorts both of which belong to the fuzzy paradigm and fuzzy mathematical space. The differences in the epistemic foundations of the two mathematical systems are discussed. The discussion leads to the establishment of the need for fuzzy mathematics and computing as a new system of reasoning in both exact and inexact sciences. The mathematical structures of the cohorts are imposed on the decision-choice process to allow a grouping of decision-choice models and theories. The corresponding classes of decision-choice theories have the same characteristics as the logico-mathematical cohorts relative to the assumed information-knowledge structures. The four groupings of models and theories on decision-choice activities are then classified as: 1) non-fuzzy and non-stochastic class with exact and full information-knowledge structure (no uncertainty), 2) non-fuzzy and stochastic class with exact and limited information-knowledge structure (stochastic uncertainty), 3) fuzzy and non-stochastic class with full and fuzzy information-knowledge structure (fuzzy uncertainty) and 4) Fuzzy and stochastic class with fuzzy and limited information-knowledge structure (fuzzy and stochastic uncertainties). All these different classes of decision choice problems have their corresponding rationalities which are fully discussed to present a unified logical system of theories on decision-choice process. The volume is concluded with epistemic discussions on the nature of contradictions and paradoxes viewed as logical decision-choice problems in the classical paradigm, and how these contradictions and paradoxes may be resolved through fuzzy paradigm and the methods and techniques of optimal fuzzy decision-choice rationality. The logical problem of sorites paradox with its resolution is given as an example. Interested audience includes those working in the areas of economies, decision-choice theories, philosophy of sciences, epistemology, mathematics, computer science, engineering, cognitive psychology, fuzzy mathematics and mathematics of fuzzy-stochastic processes.

"The World Sustainable Development Outlook series has been developed to provide an overview of sustainable development, to discuss why it is important and to provoke forward thinking on the development of a more coherent approach to solving global problems related to sustainability through science and technology. In doing so, a holistic approach is used to critically examine the interrelationship between the natural, governmental, economic and social dimensions of our world and how science and technology can contribute to solutions. This is a truly global source book, which is reflected in the varied national and cultural origins of the contributors, as well as the topics and case studies covered. Each year a different theme will be covered.Outlook 2010 provides the impetus for the cross-fertilization of knowledge – across physical boundaries, cultures and epistemic schools. The main objective is to question the intrinsic ideological value of neoliberal thinking and methodologies; and to assess whether neoliberal approaches to development are appropriate for the socioeconomic challenges that beset Third World nations. The perspectives presented in this volume challenge traditional development thought and seek to present avant-garde ways of thinking about achieving sustainable development (SD), particularly in developing countries (DCs). Outlook 2010 covers a range of topics that ensemble endeavour to address growing concerns about the problems of the third world underdevelopment, even after decades of experimentation with one development strategy or another; all of which failed to deliver the majority of the world’s population from the bowels of poverty.The main topics include: Accounting, economics and business managemen, tDiasporic tourism, migration and brain circulation, Social capital and sustainable development, Changing demography of the world and the implications for policy makingICTs, learning and development, The environment and sustainable development, Transport studies, Public health.It is hoped that this book will help to provide an overview of the latest perspectives on the ways in which we in the Third World can rethink our reality, embrace who we are as a people and leverage our intrinsic strengths upon which the foundation of any development rests."--Provided by publisher.

This anthology constitutes an important contribution to the interdisciplinary debate on poverty measurement and alleviation. Absolute and relative poverty—both within and across state boundaries—are standardly measured and evaluated in monetary terms. However, poverty researchers have highlighted the shortfalls of one-dimensional monetary metrics. A new consensus is emerging that effectively addressing poverty requires a nuanced understanding of poverty as a relational phenomenon involving deprivations in multiple dimensions, including health, standard of living, education and political participation. This volume advances the debate on poverty by providing a forum for philosophers and empirical researchers. It combines philosophically sound analysis and genuinely global research on poverty's social embeddedness. Next to an introduction to this interdisciplinary field—which links Practical Philosophy, Development Economics, Political Science, and Sociology—it contains articles by leading international experts and early career scholars. The contributors analyse the concept of poverty, detail its multiple dimensions, reveal epistemic injustices in poverty research, and reflect on the challenges of poverty-related social activism. The unifying theme connecting this volume's contributions is that poverty must be understood as a multidimensional and socially relational phenomenon, and that this insight can enhance our efforts to measure and alleviate poverty.

Epistemic Communities, Constructivism and International Environmental Politics brings together 25 years of publications by Peter M. Haas. The book examines how the world has changed significantly over the last 100 years, discusses the need for new, constructivist scholarship to understand the dynamics of world politics, and highlights the role played by transnational networks of professional experts in global governance. Combining an intellectual history of epistemic communities with theoretical arguments and empirical studies of global environmental conferences, as well as international organizations and comparative studies of international environmental regimes, this book presents a broad picture of social learning on the global scale. In addition to detailing the changes in the international system since the Industrial Revolution, Haas discusses the technical nature of global environmental threats. Providing a critical reading of discourses about environmental security, this book explores governance efforts to deal with global climate change, international pollution control, stratospheric ozone, and European acid rain. With a new general introduction and the addition of introductory pieces for each section, this collection offers a retrospective overview of the author’s work and is essential reading for students and scholars of environmental politics, international relations and global politics.