De Soto

Hernando de Soto, the Peruvian economist whose work on informal economies, property titling, and development policy is cited in these claims. He argued that state overregulation drives economic activity into the informal sector and promoted formal property rights as a path to development (and even as an anti-revolutionary strategy).

Claims that use this term

• De Soto marketed property titling as an anti-terrorist alternative to Maoist revolution.
• De Soto attributed informal economic activity to state overregulation, not backwardness