Rents, Rent-Seeking and Economic Development

The concepts of rents and rent-seeking are central to any discussion of the processes of economic development. Yet conventional models of rent-seeking are unable to explain how it can drive decades of rapid growth in some countries, and at other times be associated with spectacular economic crises. This book argues that the rent-seeking framework has to be radically extended by incorporating insights developed by political scientists, institutional economists and political economists if it is to explain the anomalous role played by rent-seeking in Asian countries. It includes detailed analyses of Thailand, Malaysia, the Philippines, the Indian sub-continent, Indonesia and South Korea. This new critical and multidisciplinary approach has important policy implications for the debates over institutional reform in developing countries.