A critical evaluation of the Flying Geese paradigm

In his thesis, Shigehisa Kasahara will discuss the The Flying Geese Paradigm through the years. 

The Flying Geese model is a development framework of collective catch-up process of national economies as a regional group. The rise (and fall) of the model’s appeal, particularly as a regional development model for East Asia, has been attributable to the varying degrees of intensity and zeal with which its proponents have advocated the model.

The analysis in this thesis compares and contrasts the Japan-centric model and the China-centric model. It argues that whereas the Japan-centric model dealt with the national (domestic) and regional (East Asian) development processes in a sequential fashion, the China-centric model now deals with two processes in a very compressed fashion.

In fact, the contemporary model admits the simultaneous occurrence of the 'internal' industrial diffusion within China and the conventional 'external' (cross- border) industrial diffusion.

Furthermore, China’s overall development trajectory encompasses a much wider area than East Asia, as its need for large external resources and markets for its own development has obliged this emerging economy to widen the scope of its foreign economic policy. The geographical sphere to which the paradigm applies under China’s initiative is fluid, and certainly much greater than East Asia.

Doctoral board

Chair

Professor Inge Hutter

Doctoral dissertation supervisors

Professor Arjun Bedi*

Dr Andrew Fischer

Members of the Full Doctoral Committee

Professor Pekka Korhonen, Jyvaskyla University

Professor Philip Golub,  American University of Paris

Dr Saori Shibata, Leiden University

Professor Wil Hout

Professor Mansoob Murshed

Dr Georgina Gomez

* Professor Bedi will not be present at the ceremony