ABSTRACT
BACKGROUND Increasing economic, financial, and commercial interdependence among nations of the world after World War II created a need to coordinate international action and policies to secure the smooth flow of trade. Apart from regular, periodic meetings of officials and business leaders from different countries, these nations recognized a need for the establishment of permanent organizations to provide stability and continuity to the process of international economic interchange. Some supranational bodies were set up in the period immediately following World War II, while more were established
in the following decades. Two major categories of international organizations can be identified as those having a global focus and those set up to meet the needs of particular regions.
