Experts or Expertise? The changing role of economists, institutions, and technical tools in Colombia's development planning (1950-1970)

A fundamental change that took place across the developing world in the post-WWII period was the emergence of persistent institutional arrangements that enabled economists to exert influence on economic decision-making. This paper examines how and why the establishment of such enduring arrangements for technocratic decision-making occurred. It studies the experiment with development planning in Colombia during the 1950s and 1960s to trace the construction and consolidation of institutional channels for the circulation, adaptation, and use of technical forms of knowledge to frame development policy. Through an in-depth analysis of this case, I interrogate whether the source of expert authority in the formulation of development policy during this period relied on the expertise embodied in the use of technical tools or on the judicative faculties of local experts.