ABSTRACT
Remarkable economic growth and social development in East Asia has been a phenomenon for decades. Similarly, the debates inspired by these social and economic transformations – regarding what was done, how it was done, and the permissibility and replicability (or otherwise) of the transformations – have become commonplace in the social sciences (Amsden 1994; Bienefeld 1989; Evans 1998; Cline 1982). Along with much-celebrated challenges to mainstream theories and models in political science, development studies, economics, and international relations (Ruttan 1998; Evans and Stephens 1988; Barrel and Whyte 1982; Hicks and Redding 1982), myths and misunderstandings have also been prevalent (Wade 1992; Friedman 1988; Bradford 1986; Lim 1983). It would be prudent therefore to start our depiction of the pattern and general characteristics of East Asian Growth with a brief survey of what has already been said in debates about East Asian Growth. The purposes of this review are threefold. First, to assess the state of the field and thus lay out the scholarly context in which this study is undertaken; second, to identify and clarify those theoretical claims and prepare them for empirical test in the subsequent section; third, to demonstrate the contentiousness among existing theories, driven by their reductionist pursuit of singular independent variables, and why a new theoretical thinking on East Asian Growth is necessary. In doing so, it helps to make the case for this study.
