The emergence of the global economy The international economy that had emerged among the Western countries

in the early twentieth century gradually expanded across the globe into Asian, Latin American, and African lands. It drew strength in part from the economic expansion of the United States, and increasingly from the growing productivity of Europe and of new industrial regions in East Asia. Within these very productive economies, major corporations accumulated enormous wealth. The economic resources of companies such as Sony in Japan, Royal Dutch-Shell in the Netherlands, or Microsoft in the United States. Global Interdependence In the immediate postwar years, the United States played a crucial role in laying the foundation for the rapid global expansion of the economic production and trade. The U.S government had financied international institutions to spur recovery from the war. Soon after the war, the dollar became the principal international currency. U.S foreing aid to European and Asian states accelerated economic growth. Japan and West Germany, once enemies of the United States, quickly became prosperous and productive centers of their regions and kept close economic ties with the U.S. Trading and investment were particularly vigorous between Europe and the U.S. The new prosperity of Europe attracted major U.S. companies. Termed multinational because of their vast financial resources invested throughout the world, they set new factories and opened new markets for their goods. Europeans held dollars in such quantities that their holdings earned the name of Eurodollars. By the late 1960s, the U.S. economy no longer dominated the worlds trade and industry. For the rest of the century, no currency could claim a stable, international value. The U.S. dollar remained the least risky currency in that unstable financial world. Monetary instability in the late century stimulated such global currency speculation that at times it created international financial crises. In 1997 and 1998, international investors suddenly withdrew their loans and dumped their monetary holdings in these currencies. This caused curtailing imports and raising interest rates to such and extent that it caused a severe regional recession in Asia. The global economic expansion of the late century drew increasingly on technological innovation. The electronics and computer industries became the most dynamic centers of the development by the 1970s. These new conditions of global interdependence made a return to economic isolationism of 1930s depression years unthinkable. Beginning in the 1960s, countries of east and southeast Asia emerged as new centers of economic power and productivity. These areas included Japan, then the Four Dragons (South Korea, Hong Kong, Taiwan, Singapore), and finally the most populous country un the world, China. The simplest measure of their th remarkable boom in the late 20 century was their rate of economic growth.