Gradual Economic Reform in Latin America questions why most Latin American countries have not nearly completed neoliberal economic reforms. Examining Costa Rica as an important example of the gradual, as opposed to radical, approach, Mary A. Clark utilizes over one hundred fifty interviews as well as secondary data to present ten mini-case studies of structural adjustment in the 1980s and 1990s. In analyzing the economic, social, and political outcomes of Costa Rica's experience, Clark concludes the gradual approach has yielded positive results, and compares this country's experiences with that of other Latin American welfare states.

Latin America suffered a profound state crisis in the 1980s, which prompted not only the wave of macroeconomic and deregulation reforms known as the Washington Consensus, but also a wide variety of institutional or 'second generation' reforms. 'The State of State Reform in Latin America' reviews and assesses the outcomes of these less studied institutional reforms. This book examines four major areas of institutional reform: a. political institutions and the state organization; b. fiscal institutions, such as budget, tax and decentralization institutions; c. public institutions in charge of sectoral economic policies (financial, industrial, and infrastructure); and d. social sector institutions (pensions, social protection, and education). In each of these areas, the authors summarize the reform objectives, describe and measure their scope, assess the main outcomes, and identify the obstacles for implementation, especially those of an institutional nature.

This volume is a successor of sorts to the Institute's 1986 volume Toward Renewed Economic Growth in Latin America, which blazed the trail for the market-oriented economic reforms that were adopted in Latin America in the subsequent years. It again presents the work of a group of leading Latin American economists who were asked to think about the nature of the economic policy agenda that the region should be pursuing after a decade that was punctuated by crises, achieved disappointingly slow growth, and saw no improvement in the region's highly skewed income distribution. The study diagnoses the first-generation (liberalizing and stabilizing) reforms that are still lacking, the complementary second-generation (institutional) reforms that are necessary to provide the institutional infrastructure of a market economy with an egalitarian bias, and the new initiatives that are needed to crisis-proof the economies of the region to end its perpetual series of crises. Contributors: Daniel Artana, Nancy Birdsall, Roberto Bouzas, Saúl Keifman, Pedro-Pablo Kuczynski, Ricardo López Murphy, Claudio de Moura Castro, Fernando Navajas, Patricio Navia, Liliana Rojas-Suarez, Jaime Saavedra, Miguel Székely, Andrés Velasco, John Williamson, and Laurence Wolff.

Gusatvo Flores-Macias' After Neoliberalism? offers the first systemic explanation of why the ever-popular left-wing governments in Latin American countries have become extremely radical or moderate once in power.

This work provides a thorough analytical review of the processes that led to the transformation of many Latin American economies during the last decade. The author examines every aspect of adjustment and reform since 1980 and suggests alternative ways to consolidate the achievements.

The wave of neoliberal economic reforms in the developing world since the 1980s has been regarded as the result of both severe economic crises and policy pressures from global financial institutions such as the International Monetary Fund (IMF). Using comparative evidence from the initiation and implementation of IMF programs in Latin America and Eastern Europe, From Economic Crisis to Reform shows that economic crises do not necessarily persuade governments to adopt IMF-style economic policies. Instead, ideology, interests, and institutions, at both the international and domestic levels, mediate responses to such crises. Grigore Pop-Eleches explains that the IMF's response to economic crises reflects the changing priorities of large IMF member countries. He argues that the IMF gives greater attention and favorable treatment to economic crises when they occur in economically or politically important countries. The book also shows how during the neoliberal consensus of the 1990s, economic crises triggered IMF-style reforms from governments across the ideological spectrum and how these reforms were broadly compatible with democratic politics. By contrast, during the Latin American debt crisis, the contentious politics of IMF programs reflected the ideological rivalries of the Cold War. Economic crises triggered ideologically divergent domestic policy responses and democracy was often at odds with economic adjustment. The author demonstrates that an economic crisis triggers neoliberal economic reforms only when the government and the IMF agree about the roots and severity of the crisis.

Policymakers around the world have increasingly agreed that macroeconomic discipline, microeconomic liberalization, and outward orientation are prerequisites for economic success. But what are the political conditions that make economic transformation possible? At a conference held at the Institute for International Economics, leaders of economic reform recounted their efforts to bring about change and discussed the impact of the political climate on the success of their efforts. In this book, these leaders explore the political conditions conducive to the success of policy reforms. Did economic crisis strengthen the hands of the reformers? Was the rapidity with which reforms were instituted crucial? Did the reformers have a "honeymoon" period in which to transform the economy? The authors answer these and other questions, as well as providing first-hand accounts of the politically charged atmosphere surrounding reform efforts in their countries.