This book examines the life and work of Ajit Singh (1940-2015) a leading radical
post-Keynesian applied economist who made major contributions to the policy-oriented study of
both developed and developing economies and was a key figure in the life and evolution of the
Cambridge Faculty of Economics. Unorthodox outspoken and invariably rigorous Ajit Singh made
highly significant contributions to industrial economics corporate governance and finance and
stock markets - developing empirically sound refutations of neoclassical tenets. He was much
respected for his challenges both to orthodox economics and to the one-size-fits-all
free-market policy prescriptions of the Bretton Woods institutions in relation to
late-industrialising developing economies. Throughout his career Ajit remained an analyst and
apostle of State-enabled accelerated industrialisation as the key to transformative development
in the post-colonial Global South. The author traces Ajit Singh's radical perspectives to their
roots in the early post-colonial nationalist societal aspirations for self-determination and
autonomous and rapid egalitarian development - whether in his native Punjab India or the
third world - and further explores the nuanced interface between Ajit's simultaneous affinity
seemingly paradoxical both with socialism and Sikhism. This intellectual biography will appeal
to students and researchers in Development Economics History of Economic Thought Development
Studies and Post-Keynesian Economics as well as to policy makers and development
practitioners in the fields of industrialisation development and finance within the strategic
framework of contemporary globalisation.
