Development as ‘Creative Destruction’ Revisited

In the 1940s, Joseph Schumpeter famously described economic growth as “creative destruction”: a process in which new technologies and entrepreneurial practices displace incumbent firms and established business procedures. In recent years, this framing has been refined into a formal model for understanding and promoting growth, culminating in last year’s Nobel Prize for Philippe Aghion and Peter Howitt. But viewed through a wider development lens, creative destruction is not limited to firms or technologies. It unfolds across nearly every sector as a complex and often wrenching social process that reshapes issues ranging from identities and community cohesion to life aspirations and state-society relations. Historically, nearly every country that has undergone such a widespread social transformation has also endured severe political conflict. If development is understood at the outset as both creative and potentially destructive, then policy and practice must anticipate how its destructive aspects can best be addressed, especially for the poorest and politically weakest citizens. Grounding development strategy in locally legitimate change processes is thus both an ethical imperative and a pragmatic necessity. Drawing on his recent scholarly and operational work, World Bank Lead Social Scientist Michael Woolcock discusses how evidence on state capability, community-driven development, and contentious change processes can inform sound, supportable, and implementable strategies. As development faces growing funding and delivery challenges, successfully navigating “creative destruction” only becomes more, not less, important. More about this event: https://www.worldbank.org/en/events/2... Policy Research Talks: https://www.worldbank.org/en/research... Subscribe to this channel: http://bit.ly/3tu3ygO