Four Asian Tigers

The East Asian Tigers are the economies of Taiwan, Hong Kong, South Korea, and Singapore. These four economies were known for their phenomenonal growth between the early 1960's and 1990's, and are of interest to developmental economies in that they were able to move from third world status to first world status in a few decades and were able to progress past other developing areas, particularly Latin America and sub-Saharan Africa.

The economic policies of the tigers contain both similarities and differences. The tigers all espoused a model of export driven economies with relatively closed domestic markets. In addition there was a government commitment in all of the tigers to improving education particularly elementary educations. There was also a government commitment to egalitarianism in the form of land reform. Finally, all four economies maintained non-democratic, and in all of the cases except for Hong Kong, rather repressive governments during the 1960's and 1970's.

It is important to note that until the mid-1970's it was not clear that the East Asian Tigers were a particular area of fast growth.

Comparison with Mainland China

One area of interest is the comparison between Mainland China and the Tigers. These comparision can be divided between the Maoist era and the era of reform starting with Deng Xiaoping. The main question that has been raised with respect to the Maoist era is to what extent was the economic performance of the tigers reproducible in Mainland China in the 1960's. The main question that has been raised with respect to the post-Maoist era is to what extent the development of the PRC is sustainable.