Wayne Grudem, well known for his Systematic Theology, has written widely in a number of fields with books such as Business for the Glory of God and his most recent, Politics—According to the Bible. We asked Grudem for a reading list of books that would help us all understand economic development. He passed along these titles along with some helpful annotations to give you a sense for each book’s particular contribution, including its strengths and weaknesses. We hope these books will make us informed contributors to the contemporary discussions about how to help the poor.
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1. David Landes, The Wealth and Poverty of Nations: Why Some Are So Rich and Some So Poor. Landes is professor emeritus of economics at Harvard and also taught at George Washington University. This is a masterful survey of the history of economic development in the entire world, by region, over the last 500 years.
2. Hernando De Soto, The Mystery of Capital: Why Capitalism Triumphs in the West and Fails Everywhere Else. An excellent, insightful book about the need for people to have the right to own property and relatively easy access to obtain a publicly documented title to that property, in order for an economy to grow and people to overcome poverty.
3. William Easterly, The Elusive Quest for Growth. Easterly has also written The White Man’s Burden more recently, but I have not yet read it. He explains why aid to Africa has never really solved the problems of poverty in Africa.
4. P. T. Bauer, Equality, the Third World, and Economic Delusion. Bauer, who died in 2002, was emeritus professor of economics at London School of Economics and a specialist in development economics. He tells in detail why all the British aid to African countries over decades did more harm than good. It distorted local economies and entrenched corrupt governments in power, and had many other negative consequences.
5. Robert Guest, The Shackled Continent. Guest, Africa editor for The Economist, describes in vivid detail the barriers to economic development in Africa.
6. Brian Griffiths, The Creation of Wealth. Griffiths taught at London School of Economics and was adviser to Margaret Thatcher. Now in House of Lords, he gives principles for a Christian perspective on how economies grow.
7. Bjorn Lomborg, The Skeptical Environmentalist. Lomborg, a statistics professor from Denmark, shows that we are not running out of any natural resource, and we won’t run out in the future. But the world is short on knowledge of true facts about the state of natural resources.
8. Several writings of Julian Simon, especially The Resourceful Earth, The State of Humanity, and The Ultimate Resource II. Simon was a professor of business and economics in Maryland.
9. I plan to read Dambisa Moyo, Dead Aid: Why Aid Is Not Working and How There Is a Better Way for Africa. Moyo, a Zambia native, has an MA from Harvard and a Ph.D. in economics from Oxford. She was a consultant for the World Bank and then worked at Goldman Sachs. She argues that aid mostly entrenches corrupt African governments in power.
Here are some books on economic systems in general and the great flaws of socialism and government control:
10. Jay Richards, Money, Greed, and God: Why Capitalism Is the Solution and Not The Problem. This is now my top recommendation for people who want to understand economic systems from a Christian point of view.
11. Arthur Brooks, The Battle: How the Fight Between Free Enterprise and Big Government Will Shape America’s Future. Brooks argues that what gives people genuine satisfaction in the economic realm is not to be given money but to achieve “earned success”—the opportunity to have a responsibility (even if small) and to do well at it.
12. Friedrich Hayek, The Road to Serfdom. Hayek was Austrian who fled from Hitler. He became an economics professor at London School of Economics and watched with dismay as socialism grew in England. He explains how government control expands inch by inch until it takes over all of life. This all-time classic was written in 1944, with a 50th anniversary edition released in 2004.
13. Henry Hazlitt, Economics in One Lesson. Hazlitt was a long-time editor at The Wall Street Journal. First published in 1946, this book has become a classic. It is a wonderful book that explains how every action in the economy has more than one consequence. When we realize this we can understand better how an economy works.
Here are two books that I found unpersuasive (or wrong) in terms of explaining why nations become wealthy:
14. Jared Diamond, Guns, Germs, and Steel. I found Diamon’s argument unconvincing because it was completely materialistic and deterministic, from an entirely evolutionary perspective, allowing no role for human choice and decisions and initiative. He thinks physical geography determines everything!
15. Jeffrey Sachs, The End of Poverty. I was not convinced by Sachs, because I heard him saying that we have given X amount of money in the past but that has not solved the problem so the solution is that we need to give X + 1 or even 2X amount and that will solve the problem. Sachs is an economics professor but he also has another job advising the United Nations how to give such money away.
[...] Gospel Coalition – Book Suggestions on Economic Development [...]
If this is an interest of yours – as it is mine – an INDISPENSABLE resource for understanding these issues is the series Grudem has done at several venues. He did the series for his own church and that audio can be found here: http://scottsdalebible.com/tag/factors-within-nations. Grudem also made available from his work website a Word doc that is what he works through in the lectures. That doc is available here: http://www.ps.edu/download/50_factors_that_can_transform_nations_rev_8-11-09.02.doc. Enjoy!
For the readers of Gospel Coalition, such a list will do much to promote capitalism as the solution to some of the economic or material poverty in the world, but do little to inform us about how to actually help the poor through a poured-out Christ-shaped life or about the huge “poverty of being” that capitalism creates within the “First World”. For a thorough look at poverty and its causes I recommend “Walking with the Poor” by Bryant Myers(http://www.amazon.com/Walking-Poor-Principles-Transformational-Development/dp/1570752753/ref=pd_sim_b_2), and its simpler cousin, “When Helping Hurts” by Steve Corbett and Brian Fikkert.(http://www.amazon.com/When-Helping-Hurts-Alleviating-Yourself/dp/0802457053)
[...] Grudem Suggests Books on Economic Development – TGC Reviews [...]
I’m glad TGC is encouraging reading related to economic development! I hope this helps us become more thoughtful and faithful people who love God by loving the poor.
Grudem’s list is good, as far as it goes, and the perspectives put forward by these respective authors are important. But economic development is extraordinarily complicated and “what works” differs from place to place and at different times among vastly different people. This list would in all likelihood leave readers with the all too simple conclusion that capitalism = good, and aid = bad. There’s some merit to both conclusions, I’d say, but by reducing economic development to such an airtight equation, the equation becomes a lie.
I agree with Matt Kemps that “Walking with the Poor” is a must, as is “God of the Empty Handed” by Jayakumar Christian. “When Helping Hurts” would take a similar approach to many on Grudem’s list, but is definitely worth careful consideration on its own merits.
Lastly, given TGC’s audience, though not primarily a book on economic development, Keller’s “Generous Justice” does plenty to dispel any overly simplistic notions of helping the poor through predictable actions and attitudes that cost us little or nothing.
Excellent list! In addition, I highly recommend the Acton Institute’s initiative. A good place to start is at http://blog.acton.org/archives/23415-rev-sirico-change-thinking-on-poverty.html.
Excerpt:
“Vast amounts of state aid and governments imposing endless regulations are not the way to solve global poverty; rather it will be done through trade, private enterprise and helping populations in poor countries to contribute to their own prosperity.
This is the view shared by members of PovertyCure — an international network of individuals and NGOs who are seeking to encourage anti-poverty solutions through fostering opportunity and unleashing the entrepreneurial spirit in the developing world.
A leading partner and one of the main organizers of the network is the Grand Rapids-based Acton Institute for the Study of Religion and Liberty. Its president and co-founder, Father Robert Sirico, told ZENIT there is “plenty of data across the board” that has long been known to create prosperity — namely low taxation, low regulation and increased market globalization. “This doesn’t come without some problems as the Pope and others have indicated, but this is the first time in human history where we know how to solve poverty.”
A really interesting addition to the African debate might be Richard Dowden’s Africa Altered States, Ordinary Miracles book.
I agree about Keller and Generous Justice, what about Carl Trueman’s ‘Republocrat’? The older I get as a Christian, the less inclined I am to completely throw my lot in with a left or right solution to our economic problems. For the record I think Jay Richard’s book is excellent, but there’s a legitimate Christian position to counter it, I’m sure!
Martin, I liked Jay’s book, but didn’t address the Christian perspective on economics. Few economists know economic history because it was dropped from the curriculum over 30 years ago. I have learned a lot on my own since then. This chart is a good place to start: http://www.economist.com/blogs/dailychart/2011/06/quantifying-history.
As the chart shows, a major change in world wealth took place around the 17th century and Christianity caused it. The Church had kicked around the idea of the “just price” for almost a thousand years. By the 16th century Church scholars had concluded that the only just price was one found in a market without coercion or fraud, in other words a free market.
At the same time, Church scholars at Salamanca, Spain began pushing for limits on state power and came up with the idea that the state should limits itself to the protection of life, liberty and property. The Church had always held to the sanctity of property.
The first nation to implement the Church’s ideas on the market was the Protestant Dutch Republic and that’s where the rise in per capita income and wealth first began. It soon spread to England, the US and most of Western Europe and caused the huge spike in wealth in the 20th century that the graph portrays.
That’s helpful, thanks Roger. I haven’t read Niall Ferguson’s new history of money which has been greatly reviewed both sides of the Atlantic. But apparently he substantiates what you observe about Protestantism and capital growth. I shall look at that link with interest.
[...] Grudem recently recommended some good books on economic development, and the videos below give a brief overview and [...]
Personally, I would recommend against Dambisa Moyo and Dead Aid. I could make some points here, but others do so far better:
http://blogs.cgdev.org/globaldevelopment/2009/03/dambisa-moyo-discovers-key-to-ending-poverty.php
http://www.zambian-economist.com/2009/03/dead-aid-by-dambisa-moyo-review.html
http://www.economist.com/node/13272034?story_id=13272034
http://chrisblattman.com/2009/04/10/the-redemption-of-moyo/
One might have thought that if one is going to investigate development economics, one would ask a development economist for a list of books and not a systematic theologian. Would you ask an economist for a list of books about theology and then take that list seriously?
The problem here isn’t that these books are bad, it’s that this list represents a very one-sided view of development economics that most development economists reject, or at least have significant problems with. It’s a bit like a reading list on Jesus that consists entirely of books written by members of the Jesus Seminar plus off-hand dismissals of two books by mainstream guys like Dunn and Wright.
It’s also fascinating to me that while we learn that Moyo was a student at Harvard, we aren’t told that Sachs is a prof there. There wouldn’t be any bias here in discussing the qualifications of people you agree with while ignoring those of people you don’t agree with would there? And while we are on the subject, Moyo doesn’t have a PhD from Oxford. She has a DPhil. Oxford doesn’t give PhDs to anyone.
[...] Two reading lists on poverty and development It’s not every day conservative Christian outlets provide suggested reading lists on economic development and holistic social action, so I want to share them here. One is from The Gospel Coalition and compiled by theologian Wayne Grudem. I added a comment on the post with a couple of thoughts. The second list is in WORLD Magazine and compiled by Amy Sherman, who I read in grad school. I’ve read some books on both lists, and while the lists are somewhat ideologically narrow and therefore incomplete, I’m glad these folks are encouraging Christians to begin understanding development and justice at a deeper level. [...]
Paul, I teach economics and development econ is my favorite subject. I disagree that a majority of developmental economists would disagree with this list. The list emphasizes free market economics and excludes the economists who promote statist/socialist solutions, like Sachs.
[...] Original post here [...]
Roger, in my mind that’s a misrepresentation of the development econ field. Nobody worth their salt today would claim that government intervention is the silver bullet for development (And just to be clear, I lean much more towards Easterly than Sachs in their little scuffle). The question is not “Which works better, the Free Market or Government Intervention”. All but the most polemical (Moyo) would agree that effective, well-managed aid has a strong role to play in international development. And all would agree that one of the primary goals in development is the formation of free market economies that create wealth for the poor and rich alike.
[...] Grudem has a suggested list of books on economics. One of the books he lists is by Dambisa Moyo who wrote Dead Aid: Why Aid [...]
Great list of books! In terms of surveying secular work, I’d also recommend “Development Projects for a New Millenium” (Hira & Parfitt), which offers interesting insight into the geo-political issues of contemporary aid as well as current trends in poverty alleviation. Another book, “Development as Freedom” (Amartya Sen) is one of those widely cited development books that identifies the relationship between economic/political freedoms and poverty.
As Tim suggested, economic development is indeed “extremely complicated”, particularly as we approach helping the poor from a Christian perspective. While there is much to glean from leading secular thought, we should keep in mind that secular worldviews define the problem of poverty and the vision of prosperity in vastly different ways. This inherently affects the solutions brought forth. I too would suggest “Walking with the Poor” and “When Helping Hurts” as a helpful guide in thinking through these issues theologically.
Lastly, while it is helpful to analyze the overall effectiveness (and ineffectiveness) of aid, it would serve us well to take a good look at the Church’s response and impact. Unfortunately, a lack of funding often prevents rigorous impact research. Paul Wilson, PhD, professor of Agricultural Economics at University of Arizona is publishing some really good work in this area, and may be someone to look out for.
It has been really encouraging to see TGC provide a platform for this discussion!