Resource scarcity and innovation: can poor countries attain endogenous growth

摘要

Endogenous growth models have revived the debate over the role of technological innovation in economic growth and development. The consensus view is that institutional and policy failures prevent poor countries from generating or using new technological ideas to reap greater economic opportunities. However, this view omits the important contribution of natural-resource degradation and depletion to institutional instability. This paper argues that rather than generating automatic market and innovation responses, worsening resource scarcities in poor countries can lead to social conflicts and frictions that disrupt the institutional and policy environment necessary for successful innovation, including appropriate market responses to scarcity. This indirect constraint of resource scarcity may help explain the disappointing growth performance of many poor countries.