User:Angie Chae

Bad Samaritans: The Myth of Free Trade and the Secret History of Capitalism

Author	Hajoon Chang
Publisher	Bloomsbury Press
Publication place	United States
ISBN	978-1596915985

Bad samaritans is a economic book written by Hajoon-Chang. It criticizes economic main stream; neo-liberalism. Chang mentioned developed countries require developing countries to change and open their markets. Rich and powerful governments and institutions are actually being 'Bad Samaritans': their intentions are worthy but their simplistic free-market ideology and poor understanding of history leads them to inflict policy errors on others.

Ha-Joon Chang (Hangul: 장하준; hanja: 張夏准; born 7 October 1963) is a South Korean institutional economist specialising in development economics. Currently a reader in the Political Economy of Development at the University of Cambridge, Chang is the author of several widely discussed policy books, most notably Kicking Away the Ladder: Development Strategy in Historical Perspective (2002). In 2013 Prospect magazine ranked Chang as one of the top 20 World Thinkers. He has served as a consultant to the World Bank, the Asian Development Bank, the European Investment Bank, as well as to Oxfam and various United Nations agencies. He is also a fellow at the Center for Economic and Policy Research in Washington, D.C. In addition, Chang serves on the advisory board of Academics Stand Against Poverty(ASAP).

Summary

Chang demonstrated uncomfortable truth of capitalism and globalization in chapter1 and 2. He found errors from theories regarded as established theory related with economic development and refuted them with economic theory, history and evidences of the day. In epilogue, he illustrated Brazil in 2037 that faced with gloomy future as a consequence of reckless beliefs of neo-liberalism policies. Finally, he argues the case for new strategies for a more prosperous world that may appall the 'Bad Samaritans'.

Arguments

In 2008, Ministry of National Defense of South Korea appointed this book as seditious documents. That is why it may arouse misunderstanding of the readers in a regard the book sublated free market economy.

Critical reception

"Despite largely favourable reviews, the book has been criticised in the Financial Times and The Economist – as one might expect. Critics argued that empirical evidence usually supports the main argument put forward by free trade economists, namely that trade liberalisation is good for growth and development. In a 2002 journal article entitled “Growth is good for the poor”, Dollar & Kraay concluded that free trade triggers growth and helps alleviate poverty in the global South. Nonetheless, as Chang would respond, it is probably the opposite: states are more willing to liberalise trade once they reach a certain level of economic development. A more convincing argument came from The Economist. The journalist admits that the East Asian example can illustrate the use of protectionism and state intervention in the economy."--Antoine Serisier

"A smart, lively, and provocative book that offers us compelling new ways of looking at globalization." --Joseph Stiglitz, Nobel laureate in economics, 2001

"I recommend this book to people who have any interest in these issues--i.e. everyone." --Bob Geldof

"Every orthodoxy needs effective critics. Ha-Joon Chang is probably the world's most effective critic of globalization. He does not deny the benefits to developing countries of integration into the world economy. But he draws on the lessons of history to argue that they must be allowed to integrate on their own terms."--Martin Wolf, "Financial Times," author of "Why Globalization Works