ABSTRACT
In development economics, development and growth are two related yet distinct concepts. Fascist states had higher economic growth than democracies, but, with the social wealth accumulated through economic growth spent on producing ammunitions, on building concentration camps and on developing other means to oppress its nationals, what they achieved was not DEVELOPMENT. Unfortunately until now, a major misunderstanding still remains concerning the nature o f the postwar development challenge. People still widely believe that by simply raising the GNP growth rate, by an average o f five percent for example, all their social problems will be solved in due course. Despite the academic consensus that the term ‘development’ has wider connotation than that o f ‘growth’, as Arthur Lewis first pointed out in the early 1950s and as reiterated in the World Economic Survey for 1968, it is a great misfortune that many nations, standing at the threshold o f the 21st century, still take the GNP growth rate as their main or even sole national goal.
