Citation

Shin JS. Camb. J. Econ. 2005; 29(6): 1111-1128.

Copyright

(Copyright © 2005, Cambridge Political Economy Society, Publisher Oxford University Press)

DOI

10.1093/cje/bei074

PMID

unavailable

Abstract

This paper discusses methodological differences between universalism and particularism in development economics by focusing on the 'East Asian Miracle' debate. It proposes to build development economics as part of hetero-economics, not mono-economics, following Max Weber's methodology of social science, and suggests developing intermediate theories by abstracting directly from given comparative settings. It also discusses the limitations that are inherent in this method, as well as ways to employ the method in actual analyses. This paper argues that the future task of development economics lies in recombining existing theories and developing new, complementing theories that will systematically delineate the diversity of developing countries.