Cumulative causation and inequality among villages in China

John Knight and Shi Li ()

Oxford Development Studies, 1997, vol. 25, issue 2, 149-172

Abstract: Why are villages that are geographically so close together economically so far apart? This question is examined using a survey of 1000 households in seven villages in Hebei province, China. An answer is developed in terms of factor immobility and processes of cumulative causation. Although a good natural resource endowment helps to initiate the process, the main cause of differential village development is non-farm sources of income: migration and village industry. Both are constrained and the easing of the constraints involves path-dependent cumulative processes. For instance, migration requires a village network of information and contacts, and village industrialization depends on the accumulation of local skills through a process of learning-by-doing and on the reinvestment of profits. There is a case for mesoeconomic analysis at the village level in China and in other poor countries.

Date: 1997
References: View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (15)

Downloads: (external link)
http://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/13600819708424127 (text/html)
Access to full text is restricted to subscribers.

Related works:
Working Paper: Cumulative Causation and Inequality Among Villages in China (1996)
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:taf:oxdevs:v:25:y:1997:i:2:p:149-172

Ordering information: This journal article can be ordered from
http://www.tandfonline.com/pricing/journal/CODS20

DOI: 10.1080/13600819708424127

Access Statistics for this article

Oxford Development Studies is currently edited by Jo Boyce and Frances Stewart

More articles in Oxford Development Studies from Taylor & Francis Journals
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Chris Longhurst ().