Krugman does a whole historical and critical reconstruction of what he calls “high development theory” post World War II, taking up important and valid postulates that were forgotten due to their inability to be modeled, which arrive, together with the economic geography of the moment, to be fundamental elements of his theory.
For his part, the debate that Amartya Sen has held regarding development and the fight against poverty is universally known, as well as his significant contribution to the concept of “human development as freedom” and the increase of “capacities”.
It is important to note that the two visions seek to try to improve the imperfections that capitalism may have, but they do not propose to give it up. It is understandable because so far we do not have a better system to generate and create wealth, but the market may present some failures.
The Nobel Prize in economics Paul Krugman makes it clear in his book “the conscience of a liberal” that liberals are those who believe in institutions that limit inequalities and injustice, while progressives are those who participate, explicitly or implicitly, in political initiatives that they defend and try to magnify these institutions. Liberals are those who believe in a system of freedom, but they are social responsibility.
In Mexico, with the arrival of López Obrador to the presidency, an attempt has been made to put the excesses of the period he calls neoliberal on the public agenda. In some diagnoses you may be right, particularly that it is important to combat poverty and corruption. However, it is not new that for liberal capitalism to work a rule of law is needed and it is something that our economy has failed at for more than 50 years.
However, the government of President López Obrador is forgetting that the best way to combat poverty and achieve greater equity is for people to have access to a quality education, as well as for children to be well fed. You do not see an educational project in this government where Mexico improves in levels of reading comprehension, Spanish and mathematics.
The Mexican liberal project of the nineteenth century transformed structures and practices to remove the country’s privileges and easements, the anarchy of force. Also to liberate the nation from immobility, from the isolation of the world that was industrializing and that rethink the existence of the old empires, but also had as its axis offering people a better educational quality to achieve greater equity and today we do not see a educational project in Mexico that seeks that goal.