Template-type: ReDIF-Paper 1.0
Author-Name: Fagerberg, Jan
Author-Email: jan.fagerberg@tik.uio.no
Author-Workplace-Name: TIK, University of Oslo
Author-Name: Verspagen, Bart
Author-Email: verspagen@merit.unu.edu
Author-Workplace-Name: UNU-MERIT, Maastricht University
Title: Technological revolutions, structural change & catching-up
Abstract: Technological revolutions, i.e., clusters of technologies that 
	 collectively have a transformational impact on the global economy, are 
	 rare events that dramatically influence the opportunities facing 
	 countries at different levels of development. A central suggestion in 
	 the relevant literature is that countries that manage to adopt the new 
	 technologies associated with a specific technological revolution benefit 
	 economically from it. This is also assumed to go together with a 
	 changing specialisation pattern in international trade. The paper 
	 considers the empirical merits of these suggestions, drawing on GDP and 
	 trade data for a large number of countries on different levels of 
	 development from the post-second-world-war period. The empirical 
	 analysis reveals a major divide in the global economy between a group of 
	 modern, industrialised countries, specialised in technology-based 
	 production, and another group of countries, specialised in commodities 
	 and resource-based products, and lagging behind both in terms of 
	 technology and income. More to the future, the paper also discusses the 
	 extent to which a new green technological revolution, with renewable 
	 energy as a central element, is currently emerging, and what impact this 
	 possibly might have for catching-up, structural change and economic 
	 growth for countries at different levels of development, e.g., China.
Classification-JEL: O10, O14, O30, O33 
Keywords: Technological revolutions, catching up, specialisation, renewable energy,
	 China
Series: UNU-MERIT Working Papers
Creation-Date: 20200330
Number: 2020-012
File-URL: https://unu-merit.nl/publications/wppdf/2020/wp2020-012.pdf
File-Format: application/pdf
File-Size: 275 Kb
Handle: RePEc:unm:unumer:2020012