ABSTRACT
More than ten years after the fall of the Berlin Wall and nearly 50 after Merdeka (Malaysian independence), one might be forgiven for supposing that the forces of globalization were sweeping all before them, both in Asia and in Europe. As Merrill Lynch boldly declared in October 1998, ‘The World is 10 Years Old.’ The new world is centred on one dominant power, America, and on the common pursuit of service-sector wealth. The prosperous groups within each nation are becoming ever more closely bound to each other by this shared pursuit, by shared and increasingly ruthless business norms and values, and by increasingly effective electronic ties. What place can there be in this brave new world for the businesses founded in an earlier era of globalization, the steamship and telegraph era of colonial expansion between 1870 and 1914? And what hope is there for the primary commodity producers on whom colonial prosperity was founded, but who are now facing falling prices and an uncertain future?1
