ABSTRACT
This chapter reviews the implications of the resulting growth of monopoly power for the ability of Transnational corporations to manipulate international costs and prices, and in relation to the evident inability of monetarist solutions to come to terms with the present crisis. It considers some of the implications of this line of argument for our understanding of the process of uneven development and of its corresponding implications for international trade and monetary relations. Bourgeois theories are concerned to demonstrate how a system moves from one equilibrium position to the next and are therefore concerned to identify the conditions required to sustain the stability of economic, political and social systems. Orthodox trade theory assumes the international immobility of factors, perfect competition, full employment and constant or diminishing returns to scale. Internal economies at the level of the plant will derive from the exploitation of mass production techniques involving the specialisation of labour, machinery and management.
