ABSTRACT
In the mid-1960s only two countries in East Asia could boast a per capita income above the world average: Japan and Hong Kong. While the Third World had been an indistinct area of general underdevelopment, a different and fragmented picture began to emerge in the 1970s and 1980s. Despite their attempts to launch growth, some countries were emerging from the stagnation trap or even showing signs of regression. Others, however, proved capable of starting rapid processes of convergence, which soon aligned them with the development standards of the more advanced countries. In Asia, manufacturing knowhow had been transferred via migration, via the colonial legacy, and from Europe or Japan. For the backward latecomers of the 1970s, the distance to catch up had become enormous: the development frontier was twenty-five times higher than the level registered in the most underdeveloped countries.
