International Trade and Economic Development

Abstract

This slim volume presents English version of a course of six lectures delivered by author at National University of Brazil, Rio de Janeiro, in 1950 and previously published in Portuguese. They do not, as title might suggest, deal with international trade aspects of economic development. Five of them present author's views on international trade theory and policies. Only last lecture addresses itself to economic development of underdeveloped countries the world's greatest, most serious, economic problem: problem of much over half world's population living under conditions of acute poverty; its two main topics are meaning of under-developed and major obstacles to economic development. Professor Viner writes with authority of an eminent scholar in theory of international trade and one of keenest minds among American economists. He also writes with vitriolic pen of an embattled liberal and free trader, at odds with most twentieth century trends in economic theorising and economic policies. The result is a provocative amalgam of wisdom and prejudice which those will find most worth reading whom it most annoys. Professor Viner is at his best in his careful restatements, based on unrivalled knowledge, of classical theories of international trade. But there are also acute pieces of analysis of theoretical issues which have emerged in recent years, such as difficulties in measuring price-elasticities in international trade on which he anticipated most of Orcutt's criticisms, and relations between external (balance of payments) and internal (monetary and fiscal) policies on which his argument closely paralleled more recent and systematic investigations by Meade. A great many of his astringent comments on popular fallacies and current malpractices in national economic policies, moreover, will find a ready echo in heart of any economist. To quote one of many notable aphorisms : There is, except in United States and a few other countries, a widespread willingness today to provide an international discipline for misbehaviour of creditor countries. But