ABSTRACT
The first two decades of the development of the Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan, the 1950s and 1960s, coincided with what has internationally come to be considered the first generation of thinking in the economics and philosophy of development. That philosophy, and the development programs that grew from it in many countries including Jordan, especially those programs that were undertaken under World Bank guidance or participation, were characterized in particular by an almost exclusive drive for and emphasis on the realization of rates of growth of gross national product (GNP) higher than the demographic rates of growth of the population. The base indicator of development for this philosophy was the rate of growth in average per capita income.
