Peru stands out among Latin American countries as an example of successful economic reforms over the past decade. This comprehensive look at Peru's economy traces that country's journey from a debt crisis in the 1980s to having buffers in place that allowed it to emerge unscathed from the global financial crisis. The book examines the steps Peru undertook to achieve these results and extracts lessons to be learned. Chapters are written by IMF staff and Peruvian economists.

As in most of the rest of Latin America, Peruvian economic strategy has gone in something of a circle, from long-established orientation toward an open economy with minimal state intervention to a period of state-led development, then back again to what looks like the starting point. In the 1960s, the Peruvian people had their first real chance to make a democratic choice between continuation of the country's open-economy orientation or change, & they chose change. Using this as his starting point, Sheahan explains how their choice was not provoked by any economic crisis but by other major influences. The majority of Peruvians, he shows, were seeking objectives more fundamental than economic growth. They were, with conflicting visions but with many good reasons, "searching for a better society." While positive accomplishments have been important, enough went wrong to lead Peru back to a more market-determined economic system in 1990. Sheahan addresses the consequences of this return to the earlier economic strategy & what might be done to shape the process of development-in Peru & in Latin America more generally-toward less unfair societies. Searching for a Better Society is different from the great majority of economic studies of developing countries in its emphasis on the basic role of social dissatisfaction with the country's traditional liberal economic system & on the complexity of social goals involved in evaluation of the choice & consequences of economic policies.

Seventeen in a series of annual reports comparing business regulation in 190 economies, Doing Business 2020 measures aspects of regulation affecting 10 areas of everyday business activity.

"Gootenberg has mined a large number of periodicals, pamphlets, and nineteenth-century monographs to unearth currents of thought that were more perceptive and developmentalist than conventional wisdom would have expected. He shows their organic connection to their times. The prose is clear, sharp, jocular, and the organization masterful. He interweaves political background with economic doctrine in precisely the right way. This is a model for the history of economic ideas."--Steven Topik, Associate Professor, University of California, Irvine "Gootenberg writes gracefully; he turns phrases with style and wit. I can't think of any other historian who has gained such a firm understanding of nineteenth-century Peru. This book will stir up interest not just for Peruvianists but for anybody seriously interested in Latin America's policy options today."--Shane Hunt, Boston University

Peru's self-proclaimed "revolution"—surprisingly extensive reforms initiated by the military government—has aroused great interest all over Latin America and the Third World. This book is the first systematic and comprehensive attempt to appraise Peru's current experiment in both national and regional perspective. It compares recent innovative approaches to Peru's problems with the methods used by earlier regimes, providing original and stimulating interpretations of contemporary Peru from the viewpoints of political science, sociology, history, economics, and education. Among the issues considered are the military regime's policies regarding income distribution, foreign investment, education, urbanization, worker-management relations, and land reform. Contributors: Abraham F. Lowenthal, Julio Cotler, Richard Webb, David Collier, Susan Bourque and Scott Palmer, Colin Harding, Robert Drysdale and Robert Myers, Shane Hunt, Peter T. Knight, Jane Jaquette. Originally published in 1976. The Princeton Legacy Library uses the latest print-on-demand technology to again make available previously out-of-print books from the distinguished backlist of Princeton University Press. These editions preserve the original texts of these important books while presenting them in durable paperback and hardcover editions. The goal of the Princeton Legacy Library is to vastly increase access to the rich scholarly heritage found in the thousands of books published by Princeton University Press since its founding in 1905.