Halfway Between the Midterm and the Finals: a Crash-course in Development Policy for Serbian Leaders

Twelve years into transition process, Serbia doesn’t have consistent, if any, let alone coherent economic development policy. This review is therefore aimed at Serbian (and alike transition countries’) policy-makers and stake-holders in an effort to distill the ever-green lessons available (thus far pretty much ignored) to be drawn from the relevant body of theoretical and empirical literature on development economics synthesized since the lifting of the “Iron Curtain”. Starting with boomerang effect of benignly neglected development in favour of mirage-growth, article tackles heretical third path paradigm, empirically (un)confirmed growth determinants, hush-hush impact of inherited time- and scale dependence of potential growth, (i)relevance of human development index, state vs. market correction, trade liberalisation and openness fables, as well as some monetary symptoms of underdevelopment. The sole purpose of this policy paper is one last attempt to debunk a knot of development myths and misconceptions still firmly entrenched in Serbian professional discourse, its policy-makers and regime’s academicians alike.