W. Arthur Lewis in Retrospect

Authors

Charles M. Becker, Duke University
Terry Ann Craigie, Michigan State UniversityFollow

Document Type

Article

Publication Date

1-1-2007

Publication Title

Review of Black Political Economy

Abstract

This paper reviews several themes from the writings of W. Arthur Lewis, both the first black Nobel Laureate in Economics and the first from a developing country, and examines them from the perspective of two to five decades of hindsight. The paper emphasizes three main interrelated aspects; economic growth, economic dualism, and "the evolution of the economic order"-the forces that drive the prices of goods and relative incomes across countries. Lewis's messages still resonate today, as he foresaw the rise of industrial exports from developing countries-and also that it would not end the large gaps among nations' standards of living. The paper both documents these rises and asks whether one could have predicted it from information available in the 1960s, or whether additional prescience was necessary.

Keywords

Arthur Lewis, Economic development, LDC exports, Terms of trade

Volume

34

Issue

3-4

First Page

187

Last Page

216

DOI

10.1007/s12114-008-9010-6

ISSN

00346446

Comments

Peer reviewed accepted manuscript.

Recommended Citation

Becker, Charles M. and Craigie, Terry Ann, "W. Arthur Lewis in Retrospect" (2007). Economics: Faculty Publications, Smith College, Northampton, MA.
https://scholarworks.smith.edu/eco_facpubs/73