Balancing and blending ideas of globalization with an understanding of historical and institutional contexts of development is an important challenge for many across the social sciences. This book aims to bridge some of these debates through the concept of 'compressed development', addressing areas of time, space, and strategy compression. Compressed Development is an eye-opener for those of us who study capitalism, globalisation and development. Developing countries have faced intense pressure to 'run faster to stand still', meaning to make institutional changes faster and across a wider range of institutions than the 'late developers' of the post-war decades. The book compares Japan earlier and China more recently, with side analyses of the United States and 'emerging Asia'; and draws in debates about global value chains, the middle-income trap, the developmental state, health and education, financialization, and the digital economy. It concludes that progress in reducing the enormous differences in living conditions across the world's territories depends on navigating through the new dynamics of 'compressed development'.