Remembering Deepak Lal

Ian V ásquezThe great development economistDeepak Lal, a  colleague and long‐​time friend to many of us at the Cato Institute, passed away at his home in London yesterday. He was 80 years old. Deepak was one of the most accomplished and impressive scholars I’ve had the privilege to know and to work with. I will miss his friendship and support dea rly.Although he was a  trained economist, Deepak believed in an interdisciplinary approach to the study of developing countries. His scholarship was original, erudite, and prolific, producing more than a dozen books published by the most prestigious academic presses in the world. He taught at Oxford, University of Lond on and UCLA, and had served as president of the Mont Pelerin Society. But he was also a development practitioner, which took him to most developing countries, and he had not always been a classical liberal. In the 1960s he joined the Indian foreign service and in the 1970s he served on the Indian Planning Commission. He consulted extensively with international organizations. It was during this time that he became disenchanted with planning bureaucracies and their approach to development. Decades later he would write: “It is my practical experience in working in … developing countries whi ch has led me to the views I now hold.”Going against the mainstream in his field, Deepak summoned the most powerful evidence and argumentation against what he called the “dirigiste dogma.” His book,The Poverty ...
Source: Cato-at-liberty - Category: American Health Authors: Source Type: blogs