Intellectual and Comparative Advantages as State Insertion Outcomes in Knowledge Capitalism

Abstract

China and Mexico had initial insertions from below to the global production networks in the current capitalist long cycle or Knowledge Capitalism but with different development modalities. China progressively climbed to high-value added links in the global production networks driven by a Competitive State that built intellectual property advantages as stated by Cheng Enfu. In contrast, Mexico discarded its industrial policy promoted by the State during the imports substitution industrialization strategy until the eighties, inserting in Knowledge Capitalism through a modality mainly focused on the Smithian and Ricardian ideology of free market and trade, preventing the country from climbing towards the higher links of cognitive value added in global production networks. Thus, the main goal of this article is to contrast both State experiences in Knowledge Capitalism to approach towards the determinants of growth and development that allowed China to climb in the international hierarchy of States, meanwhile Mexico had lost influence in the Global Order under neoliberalism.