Book Reviews

• Author: Corwin D. Edwards
• Published date: 01 September 1974
• Date: 01 September 1974
• DOI: http://doi.org/10.1177/0003603X7401900313
• Subject Matter: Book Reviews

BOOK REVIEWS 647

Lawrence J. White, Industrial Concentration and Economic

Power in Pakistan, Princeton, N.

J.:

Princeton University

Press

(1974), 212 pp., $11.

This study centers upon the concentration of economic

power in Pakistan about 1968, the

last

"typical"

year

that

preceded the widespread strikes and disorders of 1969, the

typhoon of 1970,

and

the ensuing division of the country by

war. Mr. White considers Pakistan a field in which to under-

stand

how and why concentration of economic power can

arise in a developing country and what

are

the effects of

such concentration, because problems of concentration were

not complicated there by important degrees of foreign owner-

ship. Inherent in this appraisal is the idea

that

apure model

of concentration can be usefully segregated from extraneous

influences such as foreign control and political disturbances,

and

that

results found in this model have some kind of gen-

eral validity.

The analysis begins with a review of

"the

analyties of

industrial structure," with special attention to

barriers

to

entry. This is followed by chapters concerned, in sequence,

with a brief review of Pakistan's industrial experience; an

estimate of the overall concentration of economic power in

manufacturing, in banking, and in insurance; estimates of

concentration in individual markets; the origins of both kinds

of concentration; the economic and non-economic effects of

concentration; and policies

that

have been

and

could be used

to deal with concentration problems.

The book has the strength and weakness of its method.

It

applies to Pakistan

"the

industrial organization methodology,

with suitable modifications,

that

has been developed

for

ana-

lyzing developed economies"; and Mr. White believes

that

"the

concepts, methods, findings, and policies discussed have wide-

spread applicability

for

less developed countries generally."

Inherent in this kind of approach is a presumption

that

struc-

tural

characteristics of the economy

are

much more important