ABSTRACT
Bill Clinton assessed the economic crisis in Southeast Asia as the worst in the last fifty years. As this crisis appeared to already have passed, the World Bank predicted that the growth rate in developing countries would not reach more than 1.5 percent in 1999, the lowest rate in seventeen years. The National Defence Council Foundation declared in December 1999 that conflicts in developing countries, mired in constant violent disputes, were escalating. At the current stage of development, a watchdog and interventionist state was simply in contradiction with a modern market that is integrated into the global economy. Sights were set on a transition to a functioning free market economy. The Reagan government’s top adviser for developing countries, David Malpass, correctly maintains that the development of the Third World remains an important issue for the United States. In contrast, despite continental China’s average growth rate and population of 1.2 billion, it still remains a developing country.
