Abstract
The Great Divide in economic and financial development and the convergence in financial architecture among the successful countries raise fundamental questions about how financial development interacts with economic growth. Is it possible to engineer a development takeoff by creating a modern financial architecture from scratch? Or are financial institutions and markets a reflection of underlying conditions in the real sector? Or are both financial development and economic growth driven by some other underlying variables? Is it possible to leapfrog certain stages of financial development or must all countries go through a phase of bank-oriented financial architecture? The experience of the transition economies represents a unique opportunity to shed new light on these issues.