Volume 40, Issue 2: Global Economy, Global Dialog

We are constantly reminded that we live in a world that is now connected by a global economy, one that transcends the earlier understanding of an international economy. In the latter case, major corporations situated in a core country—either the US, Japan, or those that comprise Western Europe—and projected their economic power as the post-colonial representatives of that country. For much of the second half of the 20th Century these corporations looked to the military force of their nation to safeguard investments and protect property abroad, in many cases to the point of overthrowing legitimate governments that posed a threat. And during that period there was no confusion which were the client states, and which countries commanded. Ideological differences that made up what was commonly known as the Cold War created a language that lingers to this day—the First World were the “modern” western capitalist democracies, the Second World described those socialist countries under “communist” anti-capitalist rule, and the remaining countries comprised the Third World…

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