Countries in the successful late industrializing countries (the rest) that industrialized rapidly after the Second World War had accumulated manufacturing experience in the pre‐war period, and this differentiated them from countries in the unsuccessful ‘remainder’. In the previous chapter an analysis was made of how premodern artisanship and North Atlantic emigration affected the accumulation of manufacturing experience. In this chapter an analysis is made of how colonial rule and Chinese emigration affected it, focusing on Malaysia, Indonesia, Taiwan, Thailand (with no formal colonial ties),...

Countries in the successful late industrializing countries (the rest) that industrialized rapidly after the Second World War had accumulated manufacturing experience in the pre‐war period, and this differentiated them from countries in the unsuccessful ‘remainder’. In the previous chapter an analysis was made of how premodern artisanship and North Atlantic emigration affected the accumulation of manufacturing experience. In this chapter an analysis is made of how colonial rule and Chinese emigration affected it, focusing on Malaysia, Indonesia, Taiwan, Thailand (with no formal colonial ties), and South Korea (with no Chinese emigration). The strengths and weaknesses of different types of manufacturing experience are then summed up for the rest as a whole. The introduction to the chapter presents a statistical analysis of aggregate cross‐country data that demonstrates that manufacturing performance (per capita output) in a given period depends on the accumulation of prior experience in manufacturing as opposed to other types of economic activity.