Date: 10 March 2008 (Monday)

Time: 10.00 am – 12.00 noon

Why are some countries rich while the majority are poor?  Why have some experienced rapid economic growth over a long period of time while others remain stagnant or become even worse?  Professor Douglass North, winner of the 1993 Nobel Prize in Economics, sought to answer these questions by combining economics with history, and, in the process, uncovered new ways of studying and understanding economic growth and change.  His research showed that developed economies had developed polities, and that the connection between economics and politics is a fundamental part of the development process. Prof North has also demonstrated that technological change is far from being a sufficient explanation for increased productivity.  He attributes much weight to the role of institutions, both as a cause of economic growth and as obstacles to economic change.

In his first visit to Singapore under the auspices of the Centre on Asia and Globalization at the Lee Kuan Yew School of Public Policy, Prof North will explore if Singapore, as a developed economy, confirm or contradict his thesis that a developed polity is necessary for a developed economy.