Dialogus de Beijing Consensus, part 3: Pessimo clarifications on the East Asian Model

Some quick responses to Optimo regarding my position on the East Asian Model:

First, one of my arguments against the East Asian Model involves its claim that law and development should focus on promoting economic reform before focusing on promoting political reform.  I counters by arguing that a regime's political evolution simply probably lies beyond the reach of developmental programs.  If the polity is not ready to reform, there's nothing law and development can do about it; and when it is ready to reform, no developmental officer is going to say "not yet, you're not finished with your economic development."  So as a developmental model, sequencing is really a moot point.

Optimo interpreted my argument as being strongly normative -- as arguing that law and development should not engage in efforts to promote political development.  In fact, I did not intend it to be a normative argument.  I meant to advanced it as a simply empirical claim that law and development cannot control for (i.e., promote or retard) political evolution, as advanced by the East Asian Model.  They can try, but they will fail.  Not because they should fail, but simply because that is the way our social universe is put together.

On the other hand, there may be reasons why law and development may sometimes normatively choose to promote political reform even if it knows it is going to fail.  Where and if this is ever the case, my argument would be moot. 

Note, along these lines, that Optimo writes:

However, the normative challenge posed by Pessimo is hard to reconcile with the views of one of the most respected thinkers in the development world today, Amartya Sen. In his book Development as Freedom, Sen argues that democratic regimes are conducive to development in a multitude of ways that ultimately enhance human capabilities. One of the most interesting claims developed by Sen in this regard is the idea that democracies avert famines.

In fact, Sen poses no challenge at all to my argument as I see it.  I will readily admit that democracy may well at least sometimes catalyze development (although I find his demonstration of how democracies prevent famine problematic).  My point is that regardless of such catalytic effects, law and development cannot strategically promote democracy.  I don't think Sen ever addresses how we in the real world might go about strategically promoting 'democratic' reforms of the kind that are likely to catalyze development.

But in any event, even if he does, Sen actually supports my larger argument that the East Asian Model's particular use of sequencing does not provide a meaningful model for development.  As noted, that model argues that economic reform should occur before political reform.  Like me, Sen is actually arguing against such sequencing, albeit from a normative rather than from an empirical position): it's just that Sen is saying that we should not engage in this this kind of sequencing, while I am saying that we simply can not engage in sequencing, period.   

Finally, Optimo defends the East Asian Model's advocacy of gradualism as simply an expression of the tried-and-true developmental formula that Charles Lindblom famously termed 'the science of muddling through.'  In fact, I see the East Asian Model's notion of gradualism in a very different light.  As advanced by the East Asian Model, gradualism is offered as an alternative to the rapid, big-bang approach that 'Western' advisers, most famously Jeffrey Sachs, pushed on the former Soviet bloc nations in the 1990s.  In this sense, it is clear referring to a strategy for capitalist transformation -- for transiting from a command economy to a liberal market economy.  As I note, there are very few developing countries left in the world that still operate a command economy, and for this reason gradualism is really a moot point insofar as a universalizable developmental model is concerned.

Along these lines, I would argue that 'the science of muddling through' is a different kettle of fish.  To say that we are 'muddling through' is not to say that we are being gradualist, it is not to say that we need to avoid moving 'too fast' in promoting development.  Again, my argument is that it simply makes no sense to say that Brazil or Thailand or Romania needs to adopt a gradualist approach to development -- 'gradualist' in what sense? What does 'gradualism' look like in the context of these countries?  I would argue that it doesn't look like anything -- to say that Brazil should adopt a 'gradualist' approach to development is like saying that Optimo's son should adopt a 'gradualist' approach to high school. 
 
As per Lindbolm, I believe that muddling through has always been our approach to the to development of national economies that are already capitalist.  Even as a positivist developmental strategy, there is nothing distinctly East Asian or Chinese about it.  And again, as with experimentalism, it actually offers very little in the way of a developmental model.  How do you model 'muddling through'?  To muddle is to muddle.  Is Brazil not developing because it is not muddling enough?  Or is it just not muddling the right way?  What distinguishes good muddling from not so good muddling?  It can't be failure, because frequent failure is the distinguishing feature of muddling. 

Finally, as it turns out, the fat guy on my roof was not Santa.  It was my next door neighbor.  She thought getting some horses on my roof this time of year would be a pretty neat practical joke.  She was right.  And after she came to after being hit by a baseball bat, we shared some eggnog and discussed Judith Butler.  So while it is indeed sad that Pessimo is innately pessimistic about Santa, at least he is not pessimistic about a neighbor who somehow managed to get a couple of Shetland Ponies onto his roof on Xmas eve, and who then shared some eggnog and discussed Judith Butler with him even after he knocked her upside the head with a vintage George Brett Louisville Slugger.

Which would you rather believe in?

Dialogus de Beijing Consensus, part 3: Optimo on the 'East Asian Model'

Optimo:

Pessimo's last post suggests that gradualism does not offer a model for development, but instead it is simply a model to manage economic transition. Pessimo also considers the possibility of such gradualism to be useful perhaps as a model for political transition, but then Pessimo dismisses this idea: 

"Regime liberalization and democratization are themselves rarely the product of developmental projects, they occur spontaneously, out of political and social forces that operate outside the reach of strategic developmental planning."

While development programs often engage with such endeavours, Pessimo seems to be presenting a strong normative stance here: development programs should not engage with this kind of transformation. Optimo will try to respond to both points, in turn.

First, while Pessimo is absolutely right in distinguishing a program of economic or political transition from a program to promote development, both can be conceived as programs that try to promote institutional change. Thus, while the end goal may not be the same (i.e. transitioning to a market economy, or promoting democracy may not aim at promoting economic growth), the strategies and tools of one process could potentially be useful to the other. For instance, the dual track strategy to allow state-owned corporations in China to gradually transition from a command economy to a market economy is sometimes used to reform inefficient bureaucracies. 

While this point assumes that functional institutions are conducive to economic growth (and therefore institutional reform would be the central goal of a development program), there are scholars who do not subscribe to this hypothesis. Even if Pessimo share such skepticism, Optimo still believes that Pessimo should have reasons to subscribe to gradualism as a model for development. The gradual implementation of policy change seems to be a general principle that is widely accepted among management scholars. Perhaps the most famous and one of the earliest piece supporting this idea is "The Science of Muddling Through" by Charles Lindblom, written in 1959. So, even if one is not trying to promote development through institutional change, but would be instead advocating for policy changes, the gradualism should still serve as a guiding principle. In this context, perhaps the East Asian model is the best example of such principle being applied in large scale.

Second, Pessimo is skeptical of the possibility of promoting any kind of political liberalization intentionally. It is not hard to side with Pessimo if one thinks of George W. Bush trying to bring democracy to the four corners of the world, and invading Iraq under this motto. However, the normative challenge posed by Pessimo is hard to reconcile with the views of one of the most respected thinkers in the development world today, Amartya Sen. In his book Development as Freedom, Sen argues that democratic regimes are conducive to development in a multitude of ways that ultimately enhance human capabilities. One of the most interesting claims developed by Sen in this regard is the idea that democracies avert famines. In other words, democracies avert exactly the kind of individual pain and suffering that Pessimo seems to have identified earlier on as a problem that does deserve our attention and concern, as development scholars. Thus, from a normative standpoint, there seems to be strong reasons to be pursuing political liberalization and promoting democratization in a developmental context. And maybe gradualism may be the way to get there, for the reasons presented earlier. 

Last but not least, Optimo is hoping (in its endless optimism) that Pessimo has not encountered a drunk with horses in the roof, but has instead had a lovely encounter with Santa Claus and is happily sitting by the tree opening presents at this moment. And since these are not mutually exclusive hypotheses (maybe it was indeed Santa and maybe he was drunk), Optimo hopes that Pessimo has had a chance to share a glass and have a toast with the good old man!

Dialogus de Beijing Consensus, part 3: The 'East Asian Model'

Yet another developmental model that has been drawn from China's experience is what Randall Peerenboom termed the "East Asian Model".  The East Asian Model is characterized by a gradualist approach to development, in contrast to the 'big bang' approach that was used to facilitate economic transition in the states of the former Soviet Unions and Eastern Bloc, and by a developmental sequencing that focuses first on economic reforms and only later on political liberalization. 

Pessimo:

The East Asian Model does not actually provide much guidance for promoting development in today's world.  China's gradualist approach is an approach to economic transition, not to economic development.  Gradualism makes very little sense in the context of development per se:  what does gradualism significant in the context of today's India or today's Brazil?  What exactly should these countries be 'gradual' about in pursuing economic development?

Perhaps the idea is that they should be gradualist about pursuing political reforms.  One of the arguments underlying the East Asian Monday is that particularly for the more lesser developed countries, 'development' invariably involves significant social disruption, and its is easier for more authoritarian regimes to weather such disruption than for more liberal, democratic regimes.   Whether or not this is actually the case (Pessimo is skeptical) is an open question, but even if it is, it is simply outside the reach of developmental projects.  Regime liberalization and democratization are themselves rarely the product of developmental projects, they occur spontaneously, out of political and social forces that operate outside the reach of strategic developmental planning.  It is as hard to imaging an international developmental agent strategically halting political liberalization once demand for such liberalization has taken off as it is imagining an international developmental agent promoting effective political liberalization as part of her develomental agenda.  Political evolution is something that a developmental agent simply has to live with, it is not something she can effect (and it is probably something she should not try to effect even if she could).

I will revisit and expand on these arguments in my concluding comments.  For that reason, my response to this variant of the Beijing Consensus is somewhat brief.  In addition, some drunk seems to be traipsing around on my roof -- sounds like he somehow even got some horses up there.  Luckily, Pessimo is still quite good with a baseball bat . . . .

Dialogus de Beijing Consensus -- Optimo on the Ends and Means of Experimentalism

Optimo:

In the last post, Pessimo provided some illuminating comments about what is often portrayed as an example of experimentalism: land reform in China. Pessimo challenges the widespread idea that there was much experimentation in this process, and I wonder if these have been developed in an academic paper somewhere. If not, they should be!

More important than challenging the concrete example of China as a development model (which is beyond the scope of our debate, as we indicated earlier), Pessimo also raises an important question about whether experimentalism can serve as a model for development. Pessimo's argues that experimentalism cannot bracket the normative issues, which are currently the most pressing issues in the field. 

In the words of Pessimo:

Law is a strongly normative phenomenon, and even the most hard-core positivists (like Pessimo) seem to have great difficultly separating the normative from the positive / procedural.  Almost all of the law and development projects that I am aware of have ultimately been informed strong normative understandings.  I would therefore at least hypothesize that experimentalism distinct difficulty with the normative may be a significantly more problematic feature in the context of law and development than it is in other areas of development. 

I just want to clarify that I am not diminishing the importance of addressing normative issues. The sheer fact that I am proposing experimentalism as model for development has already a normative undertone. The issue is whether we can separate the discussion of ends and means when contemplating a model for development. Pessimo's post seems to suggest that this separation is not feasible (and perhaps not desirable). Optimo, in contrast, is suggesting the opposite. 

So, let me try to illustrate how such separation would operate with a concrete example. The discussion about Rule of Law (ROL) in development circles has provided us with a myriad of definitions of ROL. Some authors have usefully distinguished between thick and thin definitions of ROL. Thin definitions are primarily procedural, e.g. if rules are applied impartially and equally to all parties involved, one could claim that there is ROL, regardless of the content of these rules. The criticism to thin definitions is that abusive and dictatorial regimes can easily meet these criteria. To address this criticism, thick definitions incorporate not only procedural features, but also substantive ones. Thick definitions are then criticized for searching to something akin to a universal concept of justice, and reducing the possibility of context dependent solutions.  

While Pessimo seems to be asking for a thick concept of experimentalism -- i.e. a type of experimentalism that would help us define means and ends, or procedure and substance -- I am proposing that we can use a thin one, i.e. a procedural form of experimentalism. Thus, the ends of the experiment would be defined somewhere else, and this process does not need to be an experimental one. In sum, according to this thin concept of experimentalism, once the ends have been defined, an experimental process should be used to try to achieve these ends. 

If one adopts the thin concept of experimentalism that I am proposing here as a model for development, it is possible to address two criticisms raised by Pessimo. 

First, in the context of the Chinese reform, Pessimo says that that fact that the reforms were not new is antithetical to the raison d'etre of experimentalism. I do not think that this is the case. The substance of the reforms does not need to be new. What is required is a spirit of experimentation, i.e. the idea that reforms will be reverted and revised, if they do not work. 

Second, Pessimo claims that the fact that the end of the reform was predetermined (i.e. there would be free market in China) defeats that purpose of experimentation. As I argued here, this is only a problem if one subscribes to a thick concept of experimentation, i.e. means and ends need to be defined through experimentation. According to the thin concept of experimentation, however, the ends can be defined according to other processes, and these may even be political processes. Experimentation comes only as the procedure according to which one will find the means to achieve these ends.

In sum, despite Pessimo's pessimism, Optimo remains optimist that we can use experimentalism as a model for development!  

Dialogus de Beijing Consensus -- Pessimo Response to Optimo on Experimentalism

Some responses to Optimo:

I think the problem of identifying ends is much more critical in the context of experiementalism than it is in the context of best practices (e.g., the Washington Consensus), because of the former's critical reliance on ex post evaluation.  If we can't agree on the ends, then we really can't do that evaluation, and experimentalism becomes reduces to simple decentralization.

Optimo appears to acknowledges the special difficulties that such normative questions pose for experimentalism, but suggests that that model can still survive.  In this, I question whether Optimo underestimates how domineering normative issues are in the context of law and development (as contrasted again, for example, developmental economics).  Law is a strongly normative phenomenon, and even the most hard-core positivists (like Pessimo) seem to have great difficultly separating the normative from the positive / procedural.  Almost all of the law and development projects that I am aware of have ultimately been informed strong normative understandings.  I would therefore at least hypothesize that experimentalism distinct difficulty with the normative may be a significantly more problematic feature in the context of law and development than it is in other areas of development. 

But then again, Optimo always has been more optimistic than Pessimo!

In responding to my skepticism regarding the suitability of experimentalism to national-level law and development projects, Optimo suggests "the beauty of experimentalism is the fact that we may arrive at different solutions through the same process, thus being able to share lessons while at the same time remaining context-dependent."  I assume this is related to Pessimo's subsequent discussion of meta-principles (attributing this, as Optimo likes to do, to that fictitious literary alter-ego of hers whom she calls 'Mariana Prado'.)  I'm not completely clear how these might work, but I do not see anything occurring in or coming out of China that fits this particular description -- certainly they have not been identified in the experimentalist literature referencing China.  Of course, this is ultimately an empirical question, and therefore beyond the terms of our dialogue (which are primarily conceptual). 

But then, Optimo does herself raise this empirical issue when she discusses the work of Chenggang Xu, who-- like many --identify Chinese experimentalism with numerous, spontaneous local rural land reform initiatives that took place in the 1970s.  As noted above, this is a commonly heard trope -- but there are a number of major problems with it.  First, this wasn't really experimentalism, it was reversion.  China had a regime of private agrarian land use rights in the 1950s, these so-called 'experiments' really simply reintroduced that regime.  It did not really develop anything new, which seems to be the raison d'etre of experimentalism as a model.  Relatedly, one could also argue that these reforms were primarily an expression simply of gradualism rather than experimentalism.  There was never any question but that Deng was going to bring to China the 'free' market structure it had enjoyed in the early 1950s and found in most capitalist countries.  Again, this is not a question of experimentalism -- there was already much experience with these reforms, there really wasn't that much variation from locale to locale, and they were known commodities.  In fact, spiritually, these local experiments had much more in common with the Washington Consensus than they did with experimentalism.  Moreover, China's gradualism was ultimately dictated by political concerns rather than developmental concerns, and for this reason too would not seem to represent a developmental model. 

Dialogus de Beijing Consensus -- The Beijing Consensus reloaded: Optimo on Experimentalism

Optimo:

We turn now to a second version of the argument that the so-called Beijing Consensus potentially represent a development model that contrasts with the Washington Consensus. This second version is based on the idea that this model is primarily based on experimentalism. 

Pessimo's previous post does not address whether there is experimentalism in China or somewhere else. Instead, Pessimo offers a challenge to the idea that experimentalism could potentially serve as a model for development. 

Pessimo's first argument against experimentalism as a model is the fact that it does not help us deal with the normative questions of development. In other words, experimentalism does not help us define the ends of development. Thus, its utility would be limited to situations in which the ends are already defined, which are often not the major problem that developing countries are confronting, according to Pessimo. 

Optimo's first reaction to Pessimo's point is to ask whether it would be even possible to develop a model to define ends. As Pessimo acknowledges, any attempt to define the goals of development and what a society is ultimately aiming at achieving, is highly dependent on the political, cultural and social context. Thus, abandoning the idea that there could or should be a model to define the ends of development may actually be the beginning of a much more promising conversation than the one that the development field has experienced thus far. Indeed, Optimo would argue that the fact that experimentalism seems to have abandoned the intention to define ends, and has focused instead on means, is not only a differentiating feature of this model over the Washington Consensus model, but it may actually be considered a significant upgrade, as development models go. It is a model that is aware of its limits and operates within realistic boundaries.

This is not to say that the search for a way to define and determine the ends of development is futile and should be abandoned. On the contrary, the entire development enterprise operates under the assumption that there is some search for a common goals of some sort, lest the concept of development becoming so diluted as to encompass "anybody's notion of utopia". But it may as well be the case that the model that will help us search for the ends is not and should not be the same as the one that will help us deal with the means. Thus, Optimo would advance the idea that experimentalism can still survive as a model, despite not helping us with the pressing normative questions that Pessimo correctly highlights in the last post. 

The second point raised by Optimo is the incompatibility between development in a national legal system and experimentalism: the former would intrinsically involve a top-down process that is antithetical to the central tenants of experimentalism. Optimo also disagrees with the premise of this statement, as it fails to distinguish between form and substance. One could argue that the substance of experimentalism is indeed context dependent, but the form is not. Thus, there is a dimension of the process that remains top-down, which is the formal dimensions -- i.e. what is the process through which actors may find the appropriate means to achieve predefined ends. The beauty of experimentalism is the fact that we may arrive at different solutions through the same process, thus being able to share lessons while at the same time remaining context-dependent. 

Regarding this last point, there is a recent article by Kevin Davis and Mariana Prado suggesting that experimentalism and other recent theories represent a move away from substantive commonalities, towards meta-principles. Since context-dependency prevents a productive conversation about shared lessons and transplanted solutions, the conversation may be more productive moving from the substance of development policies to its form. The idea of meta-principles captures this move. Acknowledging that, law and development theories are now focusing on the procedural and formal aspects of reforms, rather than the content. This is exactly what experimentalism seems to be doing. So, there is still a role for the "development facilitator located internationally", in the words of Pessimo.

Regarding the national legal system and its compatibility with experimentalism, Pessimo also argues that national policies would not be possible, because experimentalism is intrinsically connected with decentralization. Optimo thinks that the experimentation and decentralization may go together or not. And to make that point with an specific example from China, it is interesting to take a look at the work of Chenggang Xu from the University of Hong Kong. Xu argues that decentralization and experimentation are different features. While both have been present in China, their combination created a particular type of decentralization that is unique to that country (see the published version here and a previous draft that can be read for free here). 

What are the examples of experimentalism? One example was land reform in the late 1970s, which was initially done at the local level. According to Xu, when the local experimentation "was endorsed by the central government, they were implemented by all levels of government nationwide". Contrary to Pessimo, Optimo does not see any problem in calling this experimentalism. To be sure, Xu indicates that such experimentation was more prominent at the earlier stages of reform, and was significantly reduced as higher levels of economic growth were achieved. Still, the fact that such experimentation took place still suggest that there is something that could be potentially called the Beijing Consensus that would be based on experimentation.

In sum, Optimo remains and optimist that Beijing can offer something useful to other developing nations!

Dialogus de Beijing Consensus -- The Beijing Consensus v.2.1: Pessimo on Experimentalism

A couple of years after Ramo postulated the notion of a Beijing Consensus, several scholars began advancing another kind of development model deriving, as they saw it, from China's experience.  One of these is Dani  Rodrik's 'New Development Economics', which -- inspired to considerable extent by Sebastian Heilmann's "Policy Experimentation in China's Economic Rise" -- "calls for an approach that is explicitly experimental, and which is carried out using the tools of diagnostics and evaluation. . . .The proof of the pudding is in the eating: if something works, it is worth doing." [p.2]  Does such experimentalism hold meaningful promise as a 'model' for promoting 'development' more generally?

Pessimo:

'No, it does not.'

Following Optimo's advice regarding Ramo's model, we will leave alone the question as to how China's experience actually supports Rodrik's model.  

First off, I want to clarify what I see as the attributes of a 'model'.  A 'model' is by its very definition a universal template -- a developmental model is a template for development that can be effectively applied independently from context (unless some prerequisite context is specified in the model itself, which is not the case with 'new experimental economics'). Also, to the extent that 'law and development' models seem ultimately to be devoted to promoting development assistance, a developmental model also needs to provide direction for how such assistance should be constructed.  A developmental model that provides no significant guidance to the entity promoting development is not the kind of 'model' that serves the (traditional) 'law and development' agenda.

Following this, I would argue that Rodrik's model does not provide any meaningful guidance for developmental assistance, because it ultimately provide no universalizable template for developmental assistance -- at least in the area of law and development.

First, Rodrik’s experimental approach only really works when the developmental ends are agreed upon.  New Development Economics is a process by which we can identify different means that better serve some given ends.  But for many aspects of law and development, the means are the ends.  With regards to China, for example, the issues is often not ‘how best to promote rule of law’, but whether ‘rule of law’ should receive priority over other possibly competing goals – like ‘modernization’ or ‘economic growth’.  When the developmental issue is normative rather than practical, New Development Economics does not provide a model for promoting development.

Note that with regards to law, this problem can even infect aspects of legal development in which there appears to be consensus as to the developmental end.  For example, both the Chinese side and the development organization may agree that China needs to develop stronger ‘judicial independence’.  But for the most part judicial independence is as social construct -- it can mean very different things, both in terms of institutional structure and in terms of its contribution to the legal system, to different people.  One study suggests, for example, that donors are more likely to conceptualize judicial independence as means for promoting procedural justice, whereas Chinese are more likely to conceptualize judicial independence as a means of promoting substantive justice or factual accuracy in decisionmaking.  Again, experimentalism does not provide a model for addressing these kinds of developmental issues.

(One might respond that we could still use experimentalism to find ways of reaching and convincing the Chinese that judicial independence is indeed really about procedural justice rather than substantive justice.  But that gets us into question of moral imperialism, which Pessimo will leave for another time.)

I would suggest that a good many ‘law and development’ issues in China are of this sort.  There is in fact much disagreement between China – or at least China’s political leadership – and the law and developmental community as to what goals law and development should be striving to promote.  This is true not simply insofar as what following Randall Peerenboom we might call ‘thick’ notions of law and development is concerned, i.e., notions that see developmental as necessarily including promoting human and political rights, and various (liberal) conceptualizations of ‘justice’.  But it is also likely to be true with regards to more economically oriented developmental projects.  China and ‘the West’ often have significantly different understandings as to the role that market capitalism should play in society.  China’s understanding is much more akin to what is sometimes termed ‘economic nationalism’, while ‘the West’s’ understanding is much more politically neutral and cosmopolitan.  For this reason, even many economic legal reforms projects – such as reforms to corporate governance of capital markets – are ultimately thwarted by disagreement over ends, not by ignorance with regards to means.  Here, too, experimentalism does not help.

Another area in which experimentalism seems to have little utility is in that of national legal development.  As described by Rodrik, experimentalism is a very contextualized developmental process.  A national legal system, by context, is by its very nature a-contextual, it is almost by definition a ‘one-size-fits-all’ phenomenon insofar as the social space of the nation is concerned.  Here, a developmental model that focuses on responding to minute nuance of local context again is of little utility.  At most, experimentalism would counsel the developmental agent to promote decentralization, local experimentation, and perhaps data gathering.  But what would this accomplish?  Any local success or local failure could well hinge on contexts that are unique to the locale.  For this reason, local successes or failures are unlikely to be able to serve as positive or negative models for elsewhere, even after they have been ‘evaluated’ by central entities.  At best, decentralization and experimentalism might promote local legal development, but not national legal development.

This suggests that if there is a legal-developmental model in New Development Economics, it is a model that counsels the developmental agency to focus on local legal development rather than national legal development.  But there are problems with this as well.  One of the major value-added's provided by international legal developmental aid lies precisely in its greater familiarity with more global experiences with law and development.  The more localized and locally contextualized problems to be addressed through development, the less a developmental facilitator who is located internationally is able to bring to the table in the form of useable knowledge.  'Legal development' becomes reduced primarily to simply being a source of funds for local projects developed by local actors.  

Whether simply being a content-less source of funds this is sufficient to constitution a developmental model is an open question.  But whether this is a feasible model of development is another issue.  Such a model would be particularly costly to implement.  Development of local legal institutions costs about the same as development of national legal institutions.  But they benefit far, far fewer people.  Costs would be even further increased by the experimental nature of the development project, because it would involve funders paying for a lot of failures in addition to the occasional localized success.  Given its extremely high cost-to-benefits ratio, it seem very unlikely that many funders would embrace such a model.