[derf_]

This is the standard advice from the World Bank, the IMF, etc., and it does developing countries a huge disservice. South Korea banned the import of foreign cars from 1968 to 1988 while it developed its own automobile industry (Japanese imports were banned until 1998). Now Huyndai Motor Group sells more cars than GM [0]. That firm absolutely could not have survived if exposed to the ravages of the free market during the two decades it took them to learn how to produce cars to a globally competitive level. There are many other examples of protectionism in the developmental success that is South Korea. The idea ("infant industry protection") comes from Alexander Hamilton. The US relied on it heavily, too, in its early history.

If South Korea had followed the standard developmental economists' advice they would still be sewing garments and growing soybeans instead of manufacturing semiconductors, consumer electronics, and appliances (among many other things).

[0] https://statranker.org/economy/leading-global-car-manufactur...

[WalterBright]

In 1965, Hong Kong tired of being poor and switched to free markets. Their prosperity boomed.

The only consistent correlation with prosperity is free markets.

[orwin]

Participation in the global economy != free market. Unless you think China is a free market?

[WalterBright]

China's economic revolution came about by switching to free markets.

[orwin]

China still have capital control and state-led economy, even if they're smart about it. The state create a market, remove barriers to entry in exchange for oversight , then pick and choose who consolidate and who doesn't once the market leaders emerge. If that's free market to you, everything post-mercantilism is, and the term loose some of it's power.

[WalterBright]

China did not go full free market. But it went far enough to create a huge prosperity boom.

Note that there's a continuum between communism and free market. It is not all or nothing. Experience, however, shows the more free market it is, the more prosperous it is.

[yongjik]

Worth mentioning that Park Chung-hee's "five-year economic development plans"[1] were the centerpiece of Korea's economic development during the 1960-70s, and we can draw direct parallels between that and Stalin's five-year economic plans [2].

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Five-Year_Plans_of_South_Korea

[2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Five-year_plans_of_the_Soviet_...