ABSTRACT
This chapter explores the broad patterns of economic integration and disintegration – between Central Eastern and South-Eastern European states and the West, as well as within the region, from the First World War to the end of the interwar period – and how these patterns were shaped by economic and political forces related to the war and its aftermath as well as by the Great Depression. It discusses the elements affecting labor mobility in the period. The period in fact featured both integration and disintegration, and the League was an important facilitator of capital flows to those nations. Trade of Central Eastern and South-Eastern European (CESEE) countries during the interwar period can be divided into periods of increasing trade, stagnation and decline, and recovery. After the First World War, an increasing number of restrictions on immigration were put in place in the United States – the dominant overseas country of destination for European emigrants.
