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

A rising young star in the field of economics attacks the free-trade orthodoxy of The World Is Flat head-onâ??a crisp, contrarian history of global capitalism. One economist has called Ha-Joon Chang â??the most exciting thinker our profession has turned out in the past fifteen years.â? With Bad Samaritans, this provocative scholar bursts into the debate on globalization and economic justice. Using irreverent wit, an engagingly personal style, and a battery of examples, Chang blasts holes in the â??World Is Flatâ? orthodoxy of Thomas Friedman and other liberal economists who argue that only unfettered capitalism and wide-open international trade can lift struggling nations out of poverty. On the contrary, Chang shows, todayâ??s economic superpowersâ??from the U.S. to Britain to his native Koreaâ??all attained prosperity by shameless protectionism and government intervention in industry. We have conveniently forgotten this fact, telling ourselves a fairy tale about the magic of free trade andâ??via our proxies such as the World Bank, International Monetary Fund, and World Trade Organizationâ??ramming policies that suit ourselves down the throat of the developing world. Unlike typical economists who construct models of how the marketplace should work, Chang examines the past: what has actually happened. His pungently contrarian history demolishes one pillar after another of free-market mythology. We treat patents and copyrights as sacrosanctâ??but developed our own industries by studiously copying othersâ?? technologies. We insist that centrally planned economies stifle growthâ??but many developing countries had higher GDP growth before they were pressured into deregulating their economies. Both justice and common sense, Chang argues, demand that we reevaluate the policies we force on nations that are struggling to follow in our footsteps.Read More