ABSTRACT
This chapter explores the relationship between the international context, development and democratic change through a consideration of three phases of political and economic development in East Asia. A structural, socio-historical analysis of factors associated with war, rapid regional change and economic crisis in East Asia is combined with an analysis of the effects of international incentives and constraints upon the formation of domestic coalitions and state structures. The impact of international structures of power upon democratization has varied over time, and includes factors such as economic integration, geo-political interests and transnational cultural flows.1 This approach is consistent with Geoffrey Underhill’s argument regarding international political economy. He states that there are:
… three fundamental premises of international political economy: i) that political and economic domains cannot be separated in any real sense, and even doing so for analytical purposes has its perils; ii) political interaction is a principal means through which the economic structures of the market are established and in turn transformed; and iii) that there is an intimate connection between the domestic and international levels of analysis, and that the two cannot meaningfully be separated off from one another.2
