Will the Global Financial Crisis Change the Development Paradigm?

The depth and breadth of the current crisis has led many to suggest it will fundamentally change development thinking and practice. We review four ways in which the crisis may affect the ‘development paradigm’: changes to global economic governance; new thinking on development policy; opportunities to institutionalise social protection; the implementation of a Green New Deal. The global financial crisis may change the development paradigm through its impact on the attitudes of developing country policymakers towards the prevailing policy prescriptions, rather than through major structural changes in global economic governance. Although the geopolitical and attitudinal changes will be significant, it is likely that the development paradigm after the crisis will be similar to that before. A greater tendency for developing countries to explore new development models and to rely on their own analysis and knowledge to fashion solutions to their problems, could be a positive outcome of this crisis.