DEVELOPMENT as progress has conceptually grown from the previous narrow economic perspective to one which is broader and more comprehensive in scope. As economic growth, the traditional view of development focused on the capacity of a national economy whose initial economic condition has been more or less static for a long time to generate and sustain a rapid annual increase in GNP (gross national product) or GDP (gross domestic product) terms. It is the ability of a nation to expand its outputs at a rate faster than the growth of its population.
Economic growth is development in its most aggressive sense. It relies on the Adam Smith theory of the invisible hand. Its main assumption is rapid gains in overall and per capita GNP/GDP will "trickle down" to the masses in the form of jobs and other opportunities.
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