Socialist approaches to development

Abstract

Socialist development is a complex phenomenon that has shaped the global economy for nearly two centuries and continues to do so today. This chapter provides an overview of the understanding and “practice” of economic development in the socialist world from the nineteenth century to the present day. From Karl Marx’s early works in the mid-1800s to China’s interaction with the capitalist economy in the 2000s, socialism has always mixed different intellectual traditions and combined different approaches to economic and social change. All socialist approaches shared a key idea: The centrality of the state as the engine of development. The chapter explores the rise, fall, and resurgence of socialist approaches to development with a particular focus on the Soviet Union, East and Southeast Asia, Africa, and Latin America.