Since 2010, the OECD Development Centre’s Perspectives on Global Development (PGD) series has investigated the increasing economic weight of developing countries in the world economy, a phenomenon referred to as “shifting wealth”. In 2008, the share of non-OECD countries in world gross domestic product surpassed that of OECD member countries. This effectively helped put many developing countries on a converging economic path with the richer countries of the world. On account of such a global transformation, development concerns of all sorts have been deeply affected. Each subsequent edition of the PGD has examined the effect of this trend on development, focusing on different policy concerns, from social cohesion (2012) and industrial policy (2013) to productivity and the middle-income trap (2014) and, most recently, international migration (2017).

Over the last decades, progress has created unprecedented wealth and opportunities. By all available measures, the world never had it so good. And yet resentment is growing everywhere, for the benefits have not been equally shared. In the most advanced countries, struggling middle classes are growing disenchanted as the rich get richer and trust in institutions wanes. In poorer countries, the situation is different: first, there are blind spots in this global prosperity, places caught in fragility and conflict, where human suffering and poverty remain pervasive. Second, in places where the most spectacular progress in poverty reduction and human development has been achieved, persistent inequalities have been brewing dire social tensions.

Ideas about development have evolved since the Second World War, with different paradigms dominating mainstream thinking and practice at one time or another. A focus on industrialisation, planning and growth in the post-war years gave way to ideas about structural transformation in the 1960s and dependency theory in the 1970s. The “Washington Consensus” of the 1980s and 90s prioritised macroeconomic stability and promoted structural adjustment. Since the 2000s, a goal-based approach has led to the creation of the Millennium Development Goals and their successor, the Sustainable Development Goals.

In 2008, the weight of developing and emerging economies in the global economy tipped over the 50% mark for the first time. Since then, the Perspectives on Global Development series has been tracking the shift in global wealth and its impact on developing countries. This chapter provides an overview of the 2019 edition, which investigates the process of such transformation of economic geography in the context of the post global financial crisis, China’s gradual transformation and new sources of growth for continued shifting wealth. It also analyses development pathways beyond economic terms, exploring well‑being across the developing world. It draws lessons from development paradigms over the past 70 years, showing that developing nations in the 21st century have to invent their own, original pathways to greater well-being and sustainability and that international co‑operation needs to adapt to the new context.

The 2010 Perspectives on Global Development (PDG) report argued that global wealth in the world had shifted, changing the course of development for lower- and middle-income countries. This chapter syntheses findings of the previous PGD editions and regional economic outlooks. It updates the trend towards the transformation of economic geography and economic convergence, focusing on its sustainability, in light of the fact that the People’s Republic of China (hereafter “China”) has begun rebalancing its economy in the context of its 2030 strategy. In addition, it takes stock of developments with respect to economic growth and the roots of the shifting wealth phenomenon. It further assesses the domestic and international drivers behind these developments.

The process of a shifting economic geography has sped up economic convergence for many developing countries. However, strong economic growth in the South has not solved all problems in countries undergoing rapid economic transformation, and development paths have looked different from one country to the next. That is because development is an inherently more complex and multidimensional concept than gross domestic product (GDP) can summarise by itself. This chapter explores development patterns beyond GDP alone in a long-term historical perspective. It discusses the meaning of development in light of current discussions on “Beyond GDP”, provides evidence on GDP and well-being outcomes since 1820 in a broad range of developing and emerging economies, and compares the experience of early industrialising countries versus more recently emerging economies.

Development economics, and more generally development thinking, has changed significantly since it was conceived as a sub-discipline of economics at the outset of the Second World War. Since that time, one element of the debate has remained contentious: could the policies that led to successful and sustainable development in the early industrialising countries be repurposed as gold standards to follow in developing countries, or are the paths of developing countries sufficiently different to warrant alternative approaches? This chapter attempts to answer this question by reviewing how economic development has changed since 1945 and the subsequent creation of influential global economic institutions. It looks at changing approaches to development, critically reviews various periods and describes a long and complex learning process. To that end, it examines mainstream development thinking from the industrialised world, as well as “alternative” approaches that came out of regional experience in developing countries.

The transformation of the global economic geography has fundamentally changed the world and gradually flipped many previously assumed development paradigms on their head. No unique path to development has ever existed. However, mainstream development thinking assumes that policy makers can put their economies on a convergent economic path with the most developed countries in the world by integrating a common set of previously successful policies that structurally favour growth. Countries need to adapt strategies that reflect their own endowments, cultures and institutions. They also need to navigate many new challenges that previously industrialising countries did not face. This chapter discusses such challenges in the context of economic, social and environmental pathways.