Papers by Shanika Ramanayake
Sustaining economic growth is an important issue for developing countries; some countries show gr... more Sustaining economic growth is an important issue for developing countries; some countries show growth spurts and collapse in a short time, and many are trapped by the so-called middle-income trap. Mauritius also boasted rapid growth during the 1980s and 1990s, the period marked as an African version of the East Asian miracle economy. After 2000, however, the Mauritian economy faced a significant growth slowdown. The earlier literature attributed its early success more to the ‘good’ institutions.
Research revisits the issue of economic growth determinants in developing countries with a focus ... more Research revisits the issue of economic growth determinants in developing countries with a focus on international integration variables. Four alternative variables are tested, namely, export growth, trade openness, export diversification, and foreign direct investment (FDI), in a single framework. This study finds that export growth is the most robust, in addition to export specialization, and that traditional variables of trade openness and FDI are not robust. This result is based on the econometric estimations that use not only cross-section and fixed-effect panel estimations but also system generalized method of moments estimations. The findings warn against the traditional emphasis on simple trade openness and FDI as policy prescriptions for developing countries. In other words, simply opening an economy for international integration does not guarantee sustained economic growth unless these actions lead to export growth, which requires capability building in indigenous firms and investments in innovations. This observation is consistent with the experiences of successful economies in Asia, such as Korea, Taiwan, and China.
Books by Shanika Ramanayake
New Perspectives on Structural Change Causes and Consequences of Structural Change in the Global Economy, 2021
for investment in new sectors. Exports are also important due to their productivity-enhancing eff... more for investment in new sectors. Exports are also important due to their productivity-enhancing effects through learning by exporting, which has been confirmed in many studies (Reinhardt 2000; Jung & Lee 2010). Furthermore, most developing or latecomer countries have market sizes that are not sufficient for extensive production, meaning that the only way to extend the market size is through exporting (Hesse 2008; Kónya 2006). Therefore, we see a strong linkage between sustained exports and structural change in developing economies. While the literature on structural change somehow tends to emphasize inter-sectoral shifts in a domestic economy and pays less attention to the export side, export growth has long been considered an important factor for economic growth, particularly in East Asian economies. The economies are often contrasted with the import-substitution growth of Latin American economies in the
Uploads
Papers by Shanika Ramanayake
Books by Shanika Ramanayake