The Latin American Economic Outlook 2018: Rethinking Institutions for Development focuses on how institutions can underpin the foundations of a long period of sustained and inclusive growth and increased well-being. The report begins with an overview of the main macroeconomic challenges, analysing the complex macroeconomic context in the Latin American and Caribbean (LAC) region, and exploring policy options to boost potential growth, with a particular focus on trade. It then analyses the link between low trust and society’s disconnection and dissatisfaction with institutions and a number of long-standing, structural features of the region as well as more recent, contextual dynamics that are shaping LAC’s economy, society and politics. In this respect, the report examines how the social contract can be strengthened in LAC, mainly through a state that delivers and responds to citizens’ changing demands, as well as through policies and institutions which provide good and equal socio-economic opportunities in a rapidly changing global context.