International Economic Relations After the Cold War

In: Government & opposition: an international journal of comparative politics, Band 29, Heft 1, S. 3-21

Abstract

When The Berlin Wall Came Down, on 10 November 1989, and communist regimes crumbled first in Central Europe, then in the Balkans, finally in the Soviet Union, we all hoped that a new era of peace and prosperity would begin. We knew it would be hard and painful for working democracies and effective market economies to be established in the former Warsaw Pact countries. But we believed that this could be achieved: and that we in the West could provide not only material help, but also the valuable example of the successful economic system practised by the members of the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD). This system had finally triumphed over the rival, centrally-planned approach. Moreover, it was not just in Central and Eastern Europe that the open market economic system was prevailing, but all over the world. China was transforming its economy, with conspicuous success. The little dragons of East Asia were reaching economic standards close to those of OECD and their neighbours in the Association of South East Asian Nations (ASEAN) were following in their wake. In Latin America new, open economic and trade policies were being brought in, notably in Mexico. The world-wide prospects had never looked better.