IESET.
Policies·th_eastern_seaboard_programme_1982

Eastern Seaboard Development Programme (Thailand 1982)

THA, JPN·1982 – 1995·Prem rotating coalitionscandidate
movessectoral subsidy↑trade openness↑

What the policy did

Flagship regional-development programme launched 1982 covering Rayong, Chonburi and Chachoengsao. Major components: Map Ta Phut industrial estate and deep-sea port, Laem Chabang commercial port, Eastern Water Resources development, gas-pipeline and petrochemical complex. Financed largely by Japan's Overseas Economic Cooperation Fund (OECF, now JBIC). Anchor for the 1986-1995 FDI-led boom.

Policy-content fingerprint — what this policy moved, on which axes

Per invariant 3, reforms are scored by what they did on each channel-separated axis, not by the party that enacted them. This fingerprint is how the policy-match engine finds historical analogues.

intended
↑
sectoral subsidy
fiscal.sectoral_subsidy
Targeted industrial and sectoral subsidies (renewable energy, chip manufacturing, agriculture, green hydrogen, etc).
increased · strong
expanded sectoral subsidies
Large-scale state infrastructure build-out in petrochemicals, ports, gas.
↑
trade openness
regulatory.trade_openness
Trade policy openness — tariffs, non-tariff barriers, FTAs, industrial protection.
increased · moderate
more open trade
Port capacity and FDI-hosting infrastructure enabled export surge.

Enacted by

Empirical evidence — linked hypotheses

Explicit links are curated by the author. Inferred links are hypotheses in the library that test the same axes this policy moved — the framework's answer to "what does the data say about a policy like this?".

Canada’s long-run prosperity after the Canada–US Free Trade Agreement (1988) and NAFTA (1994) is more associated with market openness than with national industrial-policy initiatives.
canada_market_liberalisation_vs_state_industry_1988_2024inferred
viaregulatory.trade_opennessfiscal.sectoral_subsidy
INCONCLUSIVE_DATA_PENDING — treatment 'canada_post_1988' has no within-country variation under country fixed effects
run pending
Across a broad panel of countries 1960-2019, higher trade openness predicts faster long-run convergence of real GDP per capita toward the global frontier (the United States) than industrial-policy intensity does.
trade_openness_long_run_income_convergenceinferred
viaregulatory.trade_opennessfiscal.sectoral_subsidy
PARTIAL — coef=+6.729e-18, p=0.00881; effect magnitude effectively zero
partial
In a panel of middle-income countries 1990-2020, export complexity (Hausmann-Hidalgo Economic Complexity Index) rises more following reforms that improve foreign market access and reduce domestic entry barriers than following expansions of subsidy-only industrial policy.
export_complexity_market_access_vs_subsidyinferred
viaregulatory.trade_opennessfiscal.sectoral_subsidy
PARTIAL — coef=+4.68e-14, p=0.393; effect magnitude effectively zero
partial
Estonia adopted among the most radical market-liberalisation packages of any post-Soviet state — flat tax (26% universal rate, 1994), currency board (EEK pegged to DM/EUR, 1992), rapid privatisation, unilateral free trade, and minimal capital controls — and by 2007 had recovered to Soviet-era GDP per capita levels and substantially exceeded them, while Belarusian and Ukrainian peers had not recovered comparably.
estonia_market_reform_post_soviet_growth_1991_2007inferred
viaregulatory.trade_openness
PARTIAL — recovery threshold pass=True (year_recovered=1998, 2007 vs 1991 = 70.53282727739165); Baltic−CIS gap pass=False (gap=5.1509956229348575)
partial
Lula third-term's Nova Indústria Brasil 2024 industrial-policy package, conditioned on export performance and technology-diffusion metrics, produces measurable sectoral capability gains (semiconductors, green hydrogen, health-industrial complex) by 2030 — replicating the East Asian export-discipline conditionality pattern rather than the earlier Latin American import-substitution-industrialisation pattern.
nova_industria_brasil_export_discipline_pattern_effectinferred
viaregulatory.trade_opennessfiscal.sectoral_subsidy
INCONCLUSIVE_DATA_PENDING
run pending
Hong Kong's long-run income convergence to the productivity frontier without classic industrial policy (sectoral targeting, directed credit, national champions, or SOE promotion) matches or exceeds that of developmentalist East Asian comparators after controlling for initial income, human capital, and trade openness.
hong_kong_no_industrial_policy_frontier_comparisoninferred
viaregulatory.trade_opennessfiscal.sectoral_subsidy
REFUTED — coef=-0.06133 (sign opposite claim +), p=7.33e-15
refuted
Consumer product variety and price-adjusted welfare improve more after episodes of trade liberalisation and competition-policy reform than after state industrial-policy episodes of comparable duration and scale, in a panel of middle- and high-income countries 1980-2020.
consumer_choice_variety_trade_market_reforminferred
viaregulatory.trade_opennessfiscal.sectoral_subsidy
INCONCLUSIVE_DATA_PENDING — treatment 'competition_reform_episode' has no within-country variation under country fixed effects
run pending
East Asian high-performing economies (South Korea, Taiwan, Singapore, Hong Kong) achieved superior long-run total factor productivity and manufacturing productivity growth because export-market discipline forced competitive efficiency and technology upgrading, whereas economies that relied on protected domestic industrial policy without rigorous export exposure (Malaysia, Thailand in select sectors) experienced weaker long-run productivity.
east_asia_export_discipline_vs_domestic_protectioninferred
viaregulatory.trade_opennessfiscal.sectoral_subsidy
INCONCLUSIVE_DATA_PENDING — interaction term requested but no loadable constructed interaction variable is defined. The generic panel_fe runner would otherwise …
run pending

Similar historical policies

Ranked by axis-fingerprint overlap with this policy. Direction match bolded — those are the closest historical analogues. Shape of the match is what drives policy-outcome comparison, not the country or party label.

Malaysia Multimedia Super Corridor initiative 1996
MYS·1996
match
1.7
sectoral subsidytrade openness
Namibia Green Hydrogen and Derivatives Strategy 2022
NAM·2022
match
1.7
sectoral subsidytrade openness
Portugal EEC accession 1 January 1986
PRT·1986
match
1.7
trade opennesssectoral subsidy
Singapore Changi Airport opening and air-hub strategy, 1981
SGP·1981
match
1.7
trade opennesssectoral subsidy
Singapore EDB export industrialisation, 1961
SGP·1961
match
1.7
trade opennesssectoral subsidy
Spain EEC accession (January 1986)
ESP·1986
match
1.7
trade opennesssectoral subsidy
Özal export-subsidy and managed-depreciation deepening 1980-1983
TUR·1980
match
1.7
trade opennesssectoral subsidy
Vietnam chip / semiconductor industrial-policy push 2023-present
VNM·2023
match
1.7
sectoral subsidytrade openness

References