Théorie de la croissance : quelques développements récents [Deuxième partie : la redécouverte des rendements croissants

Abstract

The revival of the increasing returns hypothesis is, after cyclical growth, the second major theme of the recent issues in growth theory. Amazingly it is shared by two very opposite theoretic streams, namely the French « regulation school » and the so-called endogenous growth theory. The « regulation theory » stands as a general perspective on the capitalist economies' becoming. Unlike the neoclassical theory, it refuses the postulates of methodological individualism and emphasizes the role of history and the themes of structural change — mainly technological and of the institutions. The increasing returns hypothesis is considered under the form of Kaldor-Verdoorn's law. Endogenous growth theory tries to overcome the main shortcomings of Solow's model. A first attempt consists in avoiding the diminishing marginal efficiency of a factor when this one is accumulated. Increasing returns come from a Marshallian externality on the capital/knowledge stock. A second attempt considers explicitly a R & D sector and its effects on the innovation process and on the deepening of the division of labor. But these improvements involve a discrepancy from the usual Walrasian results : acknowledgement of monopolistic competition, inefficiency of equilibrium justifying a corrective public action, and a new interest for the collective, social and institutional nature of growth processes. All these points may indicate a new orientation of the neoclassical macroeconomics.