Of the four issues that are often regarded as constituting the acid tests dividing laissez-faire economists who are in favor of the Washington consensus from dirigistes who oppose it, it is only on industrial policy that my position is regarded as pro. Yes, I do believe that bureaucrats are capable of thought and that they should be encouraged to think, including what is in the interest of stimulating industrial growth, but I doubt if there are many circumstances in which their choices between investment options will be sounder than those who are risking their own money in a venture. So while I am all in favor of governments acting to make their countries attractive to innovation and private investment, I have little use for their “picking winners”.

But on three of the four critical issues my position is contrary to common views of what is recommended by the Washington consensus. The version that is apparently commonly held is closer to the version that Joe Stiglitz has propagated rather than the version I had in mind. Let me repress my discomfort at being vanquished, and my doubts as to whether a collective Washington ever believed all the things attributed to it in this interpretation, but I still wish to argue that this interpretation misunderstands what I was trying to assert.