ABSTRACT
The significance of economic relations in the East-West conflict remains unclear, and the assumptions of academics and politicians are numerous and contradictory. The different components of East-West economic relations such as trade, credit, technology transfer, industrial cooperation and energy also vary in their importance and their consequences. The functionalist view of East-West economic relations focuses on cooperation and interdependence. The cooperative aspect of East-West trade which proponents praise and opponents fear is generally common sense. The East also displayed elements of a functionalist way of thinking when it underlined the role of East-West trade in peace and detente in the Declarations of the Warsaw Pact in 1966 in Bucharest and 1969 in Prague. The Kjell Goldmann/ Johan Lagerkranz analysis includes the first half of the 1970s and therefore also shows the correlation between detente and the boom in East-West trade. The chapter also presents an overview of the key concepts discussed in this book.
