One Economics, Many Recipes: Globalization, Institutions, and Economic Growth

Growth diagnostics is a decision-tree methodology developed by Rodrik with Ricardo Hausmann and Andrés Velasco for identifying the most binding constraints on economic growth in a specific country. It begins by asking what keeps private investment and entrepreneurship low, then branches into potential causes—low returns, poor appropriability, or high cost of finance—and continues until the practitioner isolates the most serious obstacle. The framework is central because it operationalizes Rodrik's core claim: that successful growth strategies cannot be copied from abroad but must be built from a careful diagnosis of local conditions [citation:4][citation:9].

Rodrik rejects the Washington Consensus view that one set of policies—trade liberalization, privatization, deregulation—is suitable for all developing countries. He argues that successful countries like China, India, and Vietnam grew not by following orthodox prescriptions but by overcoming their own highly specific constraints through pragmatic strategies. Simultaneously, he rejects the anti-globalization position that poor nations should shield themselves from the world economy. Globalization can be a boon, Rodrik contends, but only when accompanied by domestic policies tailored to local realities and a reform of global trade rules to make room for national policy space [citation:6][citation:11].

The book's institutional chapters focus on industrial policy for the twenty-first century and the requirements for high-quality growth. Rodrik argues that appropriate policies and effective institutions can take many forms, and that the key is to satisfy basic principles—such as ensuring entrepreneurs can appropriate the gains from their activities—rather than to adopt particular institutional templates. He rejects the notion that there is a single institutional blueprint for growth, contending instead that local context and expectations must shape institutional design [citation:1][citation:6].

Reception has been broadly positive. Andrés Rodríguez-Clare wrote in the Journal of International Economics that the book 'should have a deep and lasting effect on the way we think about economic development.' Richard Cooper in Foreign Affairs called it a 'critical response to the international consensus approach' that makes clear effective institutions can take many forms. John Kay in Prospect described it as 'a model of how applied economics should be done.' The book is widely cited as a definitive statement of Rodrik's influential heterodox perspective on growth and globalization [citation:6][citation:8].

One Economics, Many Recipes (2007) established Rodrik's critique of universal policy prescriptions and his growth diagnostics framework. The Globalization Paradox (2011) extended this analysis to the global level, arguing that hyperglobalization, democracy, and national sovereignty cannot coexist. The earlier book focuses on domestic growth strategies and the need for policy space; the later work generalizes the argument into a political trilemma. Together they form a sustained case for a pluralist world economy where nations retain autonomy to craft their own development paths.

A common misreading is that Rodrik opposes globalization or economic science. He explicitly states that economic globalization can be a boon for poverty reduction and that his approach is 'exactly what good economics teaches.' His target is not trade or openness per se, but the dogmatic application of universal policy recipes without regard for local context. As he puts it, the book rejects the simplifications of both globalizers and anti-globalizers, arguing that poor countries get rich by overcoming their own specific constraints—not by copying Washington technocrats or shielding themselves from the world economy [citation:6][citation:17].