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The Economic Development of Latin America and Its Principal Problems

by Raúl Prebisch

Published: 1950

Publisher: United Nations / ECLAC

Regions: Latin America
structuralismterms of tradeECLAC

Known as the “ECLAC Manifesto,” this foundational document laid out the Prebisch-Singer thesis and the center-periphery framework that would shape Latin American economic policy for decades.

Prebisch argued that the classical theory of comparative advantage did not hold for the trade relationship between industrialized and primary-producing countries, because the terms of trade systematically moved against the latter.