I recommend looking at Hong Kong's development and the policies of John Cowperthwaite.

Economic growth occurs most efficiently when individuals pursue their own aims through voluntary exchange. The role of government is to provide rule of law and security. Rule of law and security protect investment and provide an environment in which individuals are willing to go out and build stuff or go out and provide services to each other.

If the goal is economic development and prosperity, then reducing the fiscal burden of government, reducing regulation, and ensuring effective rule of law and security will set the conditions for such development to occur. Nobody tells the individuals that make up the population what to do, they just go out and do it, in pursuit of their own interests. The result is high efficiency growth.

If the goal is control of the population, and you are willing to sacrifice a (potentially big) degree of economic development and prosperity in order to achieve that control, then government intervention is the way to go. Subsidies and government-run social services develop dependency of the targeted population on the government that controls those subsidies and services, giving the government a handle with which to grasp hold of the people. If people are dependent upon the government for food distribution, then the government could hardly have a more tight rein on the population. Control of housing, healthcare, and employment would help also. (Again, we're talking about a goal of increasing central government control of the population, rather than economic growth.)

If rule of law and security are lacking, then regardless of the other policies in place (laissez faire or interventionist), there will be minimal economic development, at least of a productive type from the perspective of a developed country. Without rule of law and security, resources are distributed by banditry and allocated by the whim of thugs and thieves. No sane person invests capital or personal effort in such a place.