You hear a lot about the importance of economic growth, but only recently have people begun to question if
growth leads to the sort of lives that people really value. For ESID, economic growth is important as a means to fuel
progress in social terms – including increasing well-being and equity – rather than increasing economic output as
.
As to how and why growth happens, there isn’t a unified response from academics, nor on why some countries achieve inclusive growth – with benefits shared across society – versus benefits concentrated among the elite.
ESID’s view is that inclusive growth is just as much about politics as it is about economics. Understanding how and why economic booms and busts happen in a country is critical to understanding how a country develops and how the benefits of that growth are distributed.
Economic policy is important, of course, but it’s crucial to give the role of politics its due. It’s difficult to understand the trajectory of growth in a country without understanding its political settlement. This blog outlines some of our main findings and positions on the value and drivers of economic growth, based on ten years of research.
