Abstract

This review paper presents the concept of partial institutionalization as the process prevents countries that ought to have achieved higher levels of socio-economic development from realizing their potential. The author has reconceptualised de-industrialization away from the mainstream understanding of this notion, that is, the movement away from manufacturing to service industry in the developed countries (cf. Rowthorm and Ramaswamy, 1997). Instead it is seen as the process of partial institutionalization/ partial industrialization of previously industrialized socio-economic activities that manifest in the phenomenon of deindustrialization. It is hypothesized that de-industrialization in its above reconceptualised sense is the main cause of economic underperformance in most developing countries. It is applied at explaining the cause of Kenya’s economic underperformance since independence in 1963. He argues that i the deindustrialization of Kenya’s main economic sector, agriculture, is the cause of Kenya’s economic underperformance because it is partial institutionalization that permits other anti-development ills such as corruption to get established in the system. Finally, it is recommended that in order for Kenya to regain and even surpass its lost economic performance record, it must avoid the current partial institutionalization/ partial industrialization approach to economic development and embrace the full institutionalization/industrialization approach.

Key words: Partial-institutionalization, partial-industrialization, underdevelopment, development, liberalization, deindustrialization.