Collective Self-Reliance of Developing Countries

Abstract

The world economy is now in intense agony — sharper than ever experienced since the War. The international monetary order, carefully constructed with gold as its lynchpin and fixed exchange rates, is in shambles. Trade patterns laboriously built up since 1945 are facing their biggest challenge. The entire framework of domestic policies constructed on the assumption of steady growth — or only minor recessions — is now being questioned. Expectations of decline in industrial output ranging over io per cent are no longer restricted to whispers at cocktails — they are officially pronounced. Unemployment in the developed countries, some say, could swell nearly anywhere up to io per cent — a level which only a year ago was thought to be impossible. The identification of economic power with international liquidity has been all but destroyed in the wake of the oil price rise. Prices of other primary commodities are falling rapidly.