Uitgestelde bevrediging, ondernemersgedrag en economische groei

Samenvatting

The pattern of deferred gratification which is a necessary condition for econ growth is intimately associated with Me categories. The private entrepreneurs, embodying the spirit of capitalism, are usually looked upon as the initiators of the first process of econ growth, & attention is focused on these groups in the discussion of the weak position of the Mc in developing countries. With the widely accepted assumption of parallel development goes the implication that econ transition is dependent on the existence of groups of private entrepreneurs. They are the soc concretization of the desired value orientation, although due to the type of entrepreneurs in developed societies, more stress is laid on managerial att's than on satisfaction-deferring att's. The importance of a pattern of behavior committed to capital accumulation in the first stages of econ growth should, however, not be underestimated. The quest for the nontraditional type of private entrepreneurs in developing countries is hardly encouraging & the Japanese case is analyzed to support the thesis that, compared with the Western model, there is a diff in the soc category which played a leading role in the process of growth, in the motivation to defer gratification, & in the way this behavior originated. The usual interpretation of econ growth presupposes not a collective-coercive, but an individualvoluntary pattern of deferred gratification originally limited to private entrepreneurs. Esp in new nations characterized as mobilization systems (D. Apter), plain living & hard working is a doctrine, a binding norm for all. As in the past in Japan, this behavior is partly enforced, partly also an expression of loyal self-discipline. Imposition of deferred gratification is experienced to a lesser degree as coercion if the legitimacy of the power elite (party officials, bur'crats, army officers) is acknowledged & their commitment to econ development as an end in itself or as a means to another end is internalized as a more general norm. AA.