ABSTRACT
This chapter sets the theoretical foundations of the book in regards to “old” and “new” industrial policy, giving a brief overview of the developmental State’s evolving assessment throughout the past decades. It will likewise highlight the shortfalls that developmentalism witnessed within Latin America and the implications that these developmental failures had for the current reconfiguration of industrial policies in the region.
In order to assess the resurgence of industrial policy across both the developed and developing worlds, this chapter will underscore the two main structural openings that the developmental State currently has: firstly, a resurgence of protectionist policies across the globe, and secondly, a growing empowerment of subnational governments in their respective pursuits of economic development. The book’s central argument will also be formulated in the present chapter: namely, that the traditional nationally centred studies of industrialisation have overlooked the rich and diverging testimonies ongoing at a subnational platform regarding industrial transformation in Mexico.
