Agrarian Structure and Economic Underdevelopment

Kaushik Basu (Cornell University) explores the relation between agrarian institutions and economic development.

1 Introduction; 1.1 Antecedents; 1.2 Prospectus; 2 Stagnation and Development; 2.1 Introduction; 2.2 Market equilibrium and suboptimality; 2.3 The persistence of poverty; 2.4 Agrarian stagnation: the technical constraints; 2.5 Tenure and technology; 2.6 The law, property rights and stagnation; 2.7 The optimality of institutions; 3 Theories of Agricultural Land Tenure and Land Markets; 3.1 Introduction; 3.2 Tenancy; 3.3 The land market; 4 Labour Market Institutions and Wage Formation; 4.1 Introduction; 4.2 Surplus labour and open unemployment; 4.3 Efficiency wage, unemployment and two-tier labour markets; 4.4 Freedom and bondage; 5 The Credit Market; 5.1 Introduction; 5.2 Institutional credit; 5.3 Market fragmentation; 5.4 Shortages and rationing; 5.5 Nonlinear pricing and the structure of interest rates; 6 Interlinkage and Triadic Interactions; 6.1 Introduction; 6.2 Efficiency and exploitation; 6.3 Interlinkage; 6.4 Triadic interactions; 6.5 A comment on coercion; 7 Conclusion; Notes to sections; References; Index;

Postgraduate