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"Development and Stabilization in Small Open Economies explains the nature of the economies of small countries and territories. It includes an assessment of material prosperity in 41 small open economies worldwide, with case studies focusing on the Caribbean and Central America, with a review of the development of their economies in recent decades. The volume recommends a suite of economic policy tools for the management of these economies, demonstrating how these may best be employed in economies that live and breathe through international commerce; while government policies affect international competitiveness and a small country's growth prospects, more important is how governments use additional resources to improve the quality of health and educational services"--

The remarkable surge in Chinese economic productivity, especially since the turn of the century, has been of material benefit to every economy in the world trading system, and the Caribbean has shared in those benefits. The most substantial benefit to the Caribbean from the relationship with China has been via the purchase of more affordable products made in China or made with Chinese inputs. The Caribbean has secured additional imports that may be of the order of 5–10 per cent, compared with what the same money would have bought from alternative sources. This benefit may not increase in the future, and may well decline, if the anti-globalisation sentiment now sweeping across many Western nations is not reversed in the near future and the region's access to Chinese products is reduced. By comparison, the benefits from Chinese investment in the Caribbean, as well as from exports to China and Chinese tourism to the Caribbean, while not insignificant, are much less substantial. Caribbean strategies for transportation upgrades and investment, renewable energy adoption, the use of digital currencies, and the universal use of the US dollar offer the promise of reaping benefits for the Caribbean from the China connection in the medium to long term, even in the face of Western isolationism.

Abstract. The currencies of Caribbean countries have now outlived their usefulness, and have become a liability. They were devised at a time when most payments were made using notes and coin, issued in distant metropolitan centres. Scarcity of the means of payment was a severe hindrance to commerce. In response Currency Boards were set up, to issue local currency as needed in the colonies. The system worked well because the local currency issue was backed by an equivalent value of Sterling, in a global system of fixed exchange rates. In contrast, nowadays payments are made mostly by electronic communication, credit and debit cards, cheques and drafts, with settlement over digitized bank accounts. In today's world an own currency has become a liability for small economies, limiting access to international goods and services, exposing residents to risks of currency devaluation and inflation, eroding the value of domestic savings, increasing economic inequalities, providing a tool for unproductive government spending, and diverting attention from the need to increase productivity and enhance international competitiveness.Keywords. Dollarisation, Exchange rate, Fixed exchange rate, Foreign currency, Currency board, Open economy.JEL. F31, F32.