| An overview of existing empirical insights
on the interrelationship between the socio-cultural dimension and economic development.
Why do some immigrant ethnic groups have more successful entrepreneurs than others? Has
the Chinese family been an engine or an obstacle to economic development? What happens to
socioeconomic development if traditional legal arrangements in less developed countries
are confronted with the Western legal system? How do informal networks affect
entrepreneurship and the working of markets? What all these questions have in common is
that they point towards potential cultural or social determinants of economic development.
Whether and how modern theories in cultural anthropology, sociology, and
social psychology can contribute to the proper analysis of processes of development?
Can the state of socio-economic development be assessed in relation to the
questions of unemployment and its consequences, the educational condition, the health and
nutritional status of the people and the housing condition in the country?
Can native administered socio-economic development initiatives overcome
the inherent conflict in the need to access wider economic opportunities and at the same
time guard and enhance their own social traditions and cultural identities?
How concepts like “global culture”, “organizational
culture”, “gender culture” help in the analysis of economic development?
Which are the theoretical instruments necessary to analyze processes of
economic development in a social and cultural context?
What are the links between population growth and economic development?
How issues of the environment affect human development and economic
development?
What are the causes and socio-economic effects of foreign direct
investment and whether the inflow of of foreign capital has both "desirable" and
"undesirable" socio-economic effects?
What are the inter-relations between the major factors of developmental
performance and their effects on sustained societal development?
Why, in spite of the progress since the fall of Communism, do countries in
Central and Eastern Europe still fall short of having been transformed into propulsive,
"vibrant" societies, with intellectually open-minded, socially and
technologically innovative environments?
How capitalism contributes to the development and underdevelopment of the
Third World? |