BOOK REVIEW: TRANSFORMATIVE ECONOMICS; UNDERSTANDING THE PATHWAY TO ECONOMIC TRANSFORMATION
AUTHOR: PROF AUGUSTUS NUWAGABA
PP: 356 pages
The challenge for Uganda is to lift the economy from a
pre-industrial to a modern one. To lift the majority of citizens out of poverty,
though increasing their productivity and therefore earning power. A modern state would be characterized by higher
productivity in every sector, better living standards for all, trade in processed/manufactured
goods, industrialization towards a more ICT driven economy among others.
To do this one has to understand where you are in the continuum of development and how you got there before you can fashion a route to development.
Professor August Nuwagaba does this simply enough for anyone
to understand.
He identifies that land tenure system as designed in the Buganda
Land agreement as a major impediment to our economic advancement, shows that
the expulsion of the Asians in 1972 was a disaster and that by liberalizing markets,
privatization of state enterprises and introduction of tax reforms the current government
did the right things to resuscitate the economy.
The neo-liberal policies that have got us to this point,
with its emphasis on fixing the macroeconomic environment and hope for a
trickle down of the benefits, has taken us as far as it can, with a small elite
benefitting disproportionately to the larger public.
So in his book—as the title suggests, he tries to chart a
way for lifting the Uganda economy from its current state to an industrial and
post-industrial economy.
Nuwagaba has strong opinions on how the drivers of the
economic recovery of the last four decades can be retooled to drive
transformation. Economic policy, monetary policy, debt management and aid among
other things but he is clear that it first begins with the individual.
"Each individual has a responsibility to raise their income,
save and invest more and remain healthy and it is on this that all other
drivers can be built....
We will not be reinventing the wheel and Nuwagaba has some
interest case studies from the Asian tigers and Europe that light the path for
us. The retooling of education away from producing learned graduates to
churning out individuals with the relevant skills for the various stages of their
development path is key and plays on the notion that all progress starts with the
individual.
It is clear through the book that while we deserve a pat on
the back for resuscitating the economy over the last 40 or so, this has only
served to create a foundation for the real heavy lifting that is to come. Another
mind shift is required and disciplined execution of a well thought out strategy
is imperative.
A major omission that is hard to ignore however, is the role
of corruption in slowing or subverting progress. While no country is corruption
free, for a developing country like ours corruption concentrates resources in a
few hands, denies the majority the services required for them to lift themselves
out of poverty, distorts markets and threatens social and national security.
While it is a whole subject on its own, ignoring it misses a
major piece of our context and why the best laid plans can still go awry.
"Development is not a natural progression. It can be subverted by human beings ignorance, ideological disorientation and putting their wants above those of the greater public. Our history is littered with how damaging a lack of strategic focus can lead to misguided actions however popular that can derail progress for generations.
As mentioned earlier, the book does not require any high appreciation
of economics to follow the logical thread Nuwagaba has woven through space and
time, where we came from and what we need to do to deliver a better future for
our country. The book would do with a lot more contemporary case studies especially
of how policies like liberalization and privatization have got us to where we
are.
This book is a useful reference for anyone wanting to
understand why we are where we are as an economy and what needs to be done for
us to get to the next level. This book should be required reading for Ugandan
economists and planners. It is a useful addition to the study of the economic
history of this country.
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