Economic development and complexity: the role of recombinant capital

Anthony M Endres and David A Harper

Cambridge Journal of Economics, 2020, vol. 44, issue 1, 157-180

Abstract: The neoclassical aggregate production-function concept of capital is unsuitable for the study of economic development. We provide a more realistic account of capital formation in which development is understood as a disruptive, disequilibrium process of creating (not merely allocating or accumulating) capital and in which capital is conceived as a ‘recombinant’ process. We draw upon the seminal ideas of Schumpeter, Lachmann and Hirschman to formulate the notion of recombinant capital. Capital is a complex, emergent constellation of resource connections rather than a neoclassical ‘stock’. We conceptualise recombinant capital formation as a process of transforming connections in production structures. Capital structures are the unintended outcome of polycentric interactions among private entrepreneurs and government actors (managers of state-owned enterprises and political entrepreneurs). Recombinant capital formation and capital structures emerge endogenously from the creation and destruction of complex connections. The standard distinction between ‘market failure’ and ‘government failure’ is critically deficient in analysing the structural economic dynamics engendered by recombinant capital. The fertility of our conceptual framework is illustrated by a study of major structural change in a small open economy. This structural change arose from the interpolation of a new, large-scale manufacturing industry in a capital structure previously dominated by primary industries.

Keywords: Neoclassical capital; Economic development; Schumpeter; Recombinant capital; Capital structure; Capital complexity; Market failure; Government failure (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2020
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