In the recent economic history of Latin America no country has yet found the means to combine effectively economic growth with equity. Unavoidable Industrial Restructuring in Latin America compares the development path of Latin America with that of the East Asian newly industrialized countries (NICs), the United States, and Europe in the 1970s and 1980s to show the national policies and international cooperation necessary to set Latin American countries on the road to healthy economies.
Fernando Fajnzylber argues that technological and industrial progress is the driving force of a positive relationship among dynamism, competitiveness, austerity, and equity. Latin America’s failure to master this technological progress underlies its economic difficulties. To overcome the inheritance of past mistakes, the author maintains, Latin America must undergo not only macroeconomic stabilization and a reduction of the debt burden, but also a complete transformation of the production structure. The role of the state and the institutional setup need to be modified and new social and sectoral policies devised. Fajnzylber sees this radical restructuring as an unavoidable step if Latin America is ever to achieve a workable balance between growth and equity.