Introduction to Comparative Economic Development — DU B.A. (Hons.) Economics Previous Year Question Papers

1. Discuss the preconditions for industrialization in Britain. Why was it Britain and not any other nation that was the first to industrialise? Discuss. 2. Analytically discuss the claim that the British government's economic policy and theory since the Industrial Revolution was essentially that of the rise and fall of laissez faire. 3. Discuss the Agrarian reforms and changes in Japan from the Meiji Restoration till the aftermath of the World War II. 4. Discuss the importance of strategic industries in the first stage of Japanese industrialisation. How were they related to naval and military objectives? 5. Explain the system of central planning in the Soviet Union. 6. Critically discuss the role of state in the initial period of a country's industrialisation. Discuss with help of the examples of Britain, Japan, and the Soviet Union. 7. "It is the segregation of the British manual worker's world which is so striking" (E.J. Hobsbawm). Analyse the nature of this segregation and the growth of class consciousness in the British working class and briefly compare it to the Japanese experience in the phase of industrialization. 8. Was the collectivisation of agriculture in Soviet Union primarily a means to exploit agriculture for industrialisation or were there other motivations behind it? Comment. Discuss the varied responses of the peasants to the collectivisation process.