ABSTRACT
This chapter attempts to study how and to what extent US foreign policy played the role of embanking a chain of capitalist market economies in East and Southeast Asia. The Four Little Dragons: Hong Kong, Taiwan, South Korea, and Singapore, were especially affected by such embankment. The increase in trade and the expansion of Hong Kong’s export market propelled the economic development of Hong Kong and stabilized the then-unsteady relation then between the citizens and the government. The political, economic, and strategic position of Taiwan was not only included in US long-term interest in the Far East but also became an irreconcilable antagonistic issue with mainland China. South Korea’s economic growth is generally characterized by a large-scale conglomeration of such industrial powers and reliance on market forces. Singapore experienced another unique experience of transformation from small, open economy into a universally recognized cosmopolitan city-state. US foreign policy objectives in transforming Southeast Asia were initiated in 1959.
