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Oil, Other Scarcities, and the Poor Countries

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  18 July 2011

John P. Lewis
Affiliation:
Princeton University
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Abstract

Classic, optimistic, post-World War II development strategy (whereunder the new states, catalyzed by temporary, modest injections of foreign aid, were to achieve accelerated growth, improved mass welfare, and national self-reliance) already was in trouble before it was overtaken by growing awareness of natural-resource scarcities. But, at least in their Limits-of-Growth version, the latter seem to challenge the strategy fundamentally. Six hypotheses for reconciling scarcities and development are: (1) world zero population growth needs urgent promotion; but (2) there is no comparable early need for arresting global economic growth; (3) the poor countries, along with more equity, need faster growth and therefore continuing regularized net transfers from the rich; (4) the rich, while sharing some of their growth dividends with the poor through scarcity-related market adjustments, will keep growing enough also to provide net transfers; (5) the oil crisis is so extreme a case of the problem that it confuses more than it teaches; (6) in a system that is still nation-state dominated, the mixture of cooperative and conflicted scenarios for promoting development in a context of scarcity may veer toward the former as affluent decision makers are “subverted” into planetary perspectives.

Type
Research Article
Copyright
Copyright © Trustees of Princeton University 1974

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References

1 U.S. Commission on Population Growth and the American Future, Population, Resources, and the Environment, Ridker, R. G., ed. (Washington, D.C. 1972Google Scholar), III; see also Ridker, , “To Grow or Not to Grow: That's Not the Relevant Question,” Science, CLXXXII (December 28, 1973), 1315CrossRefGoogle Scholar–18.