Angus Maddison
Angus Maddison is a Visiting Professor at the United Nations University (MERIT) at Maastricht, and Emeritus Professor of Economic Growth and Development at the University of Groningen. He held a number of senior positions at the Organisation for European Economic Co-operation (OEEC) and OECD between 1953 and 1978, and has been a policy adviser to governments in Brazil, Ghana, Greece, Mexico and Pakistan. He is the author of 20 books on the long-term economic performance of nations and interactions within the world economy; and has built up an international network of scholars working in this field. He is a fellow of the British Academy, member of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, Commandeur in the Netherlands Order of Orange Nasssau, an honorary fellow of Selwyn College, Cambridge, and an honorary doctor of Hitotsubashi University in Japan. His latest book is Contours of the World Economy, 1–2030 AD: Essays in Macroeconomic History (Oxford University Press, 2007).
Papers Published in World Economics:
The West and the Rest in the World Economy: 1000–2030
This paper analyses the forces determining per capita income levels of nations
over the past millennium and the prospects to 2030. In the year 1000 AD,
Asian countries were in the lead. By 1820, per capita GDP in Western Europe
and the US was twice the Asian average. The divergence had grown much
bigger by 1950, but by the 1970s, several Asian countries – Japan, South Korea,
Taiwan, Hong Kong and Singapore – had achieved considerable catch up. Since
then, there has been a major surge in China and the beginning of a similar
phenomenon in India. As a result, the Asian share of world income has risen
steadily and, by 2030, will be fairly close to what it was in 1820. Maddison
concludes by comparing his analysis with the Malthusian interpretation of
Oded Galor.
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