The 10 commandments of the Washington Consensus, which have been written down by John Williamson (1989), got upgraded/ augmented later on with another set of advises. In Rodrik's work of 2003, he summaries it and calling it the Augmented Washington Consensus (AWC) as follows:
The initial commandments
1)Fiscal discipline. 2)Reorientation of public expenditures. 3)Tax reform. 4 Interest rate liberalization. 5)Unified and competitive exchange rates. 6)Trade liberalization . 7) Openness to DFI. 8)Privatization. 9) Deregulation. 10) Secure Property Rights
The Augmentation
11)Corporate governance. 12)Anti-corruption. 13)Flexible labor markets. 14)Adherence to WTO disciplines . 15)Adherence to intl. financial codes and standards. 16)Prudent capital-account opening. 17)Non-intermediate exchange rate regimes. 18)Independent central banks/ inflation targeting. 19)Social safty nets. 20)Targeted poverty reduction
Do these 20 points relate to the Agenda 2030? and if yes, to what extend and which ones?
It seams to me that the AWC asks for smaller state, while the 2030 is asking for a more role of the state. One could argue that the 2030 is a general framework and does not necessarily focus on development economics as the AWC does. However, I could argue against that for different reasons. One of them is that the AWC misses important points such as the environment, while the 2030 does otherwise. Other argument could be, that the International Financial Institutions (IFIs) we have nowadays lack the ability to tackle our pressing challenges, still, they are the ones who lead and set development policies - the development policies that influence our welfare, prosperity, and environment more than anything else.
The frame of ASD 2030 is 'collaborative partnership'. In other words, find opportunities in the dynamics of the state, society and market. That is a nonlinear space, and in SSA the space is strongly non-ergodic. That means prescriptions are of little value. Challenges have to be managed in an incremental and reflexive way. Question the efficacy of global targets and prescriptions. Anyway, to the extent that we see two prescriptions, the two camps are bound.
Perhaps you will find the comparison above more helpful than causality tracking.
Thank you Fred for your contribution.
I'd say that your proposal would be my ultimate approach. But what I am trying to do here is two things: Firstly, I want to know what kind of economic developments theory/ philosophy the Agenda 2030 has; and if it does not have, which was the case of the preceding MDGs, I would rather say that we need to theories it and specify its goals. Secondly, I want check if they are going in the same direction as the IMF and WBG are currently do; And I think, and hope, that Agenda 2030 has a different spirit.
At the moment, I am going through the 169 clauses of the Agenda and checking them with Augmented Washington Consensus.
Will let you know about the similarities and disparities
That SDGs are mostly a revised version of MDGs is settled, to a large extent. We may call SDGs Augmented Development Goals in Rodrikian terms. I agree with the fact that the Washington consensus lacks focus on pertinent environmental issues. As Fred eloquently puts it, as far as policy prescriptions are concerned, the two camps are inter-related. However, the comparison seems to end with social safety nets and targeted poverty reduction. This is because both the initial commandments and the AWC are mainly dealing with issues of political economy and macro-economic factors—with a focus on regulation and market/fiscal discipline.
By contrast, SDGs target both existential issues and the impact of emergent wicked problems such as climate change on agriculture/food/water, economic liberties/inequalities and income distribution; by employing the inputs of various stakeholders to solve complex global problems. While we question such top-down prescriptions, a relevant question is where will the financial resources for achieving these targets come from? Why are the fundamental catalysts such as technological and scientific innovations for spurring economic development and radical social change in the global South (not just fancy growth rates) missing in AWC? Without radical mutations in institutional structures, these prescriptions will remain a wish list as some problems will be solved while the major problems will be replaced with new ones. I look forward to hearing more about how you identify how some of the 20 points relate to Agenda 2030 as well as their scope and which operational mechanisms and partners in development make them different in scope and efficacy. You may also wish to communicate the purpose of the study. It would be interesting to know what questions can be posed beyond the similarities and differences.
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