The starting point of our discussion is the distinction that is commonly made between economic growth and economic development. The development profession has been virtually unanimous in its insistence on the necessity of clearly distinguishing between economic growth and structural change on the one hand, and economic growth and economic development on the other hand, with structural change itself often being equated with ‘development’. Dissenting voices have been heard recently (for example, Palma, 1978; Bernstein, 1979; Warren, 1980), but across the spectrum of development economics-neo-classical, structuralist, dependency and neoMarxist-the assumption remains that it is both valid and useful to make the distinction.