Capitalist Restructuring and the Pacific Rim

This book situates the evolution of the high growth economies along Asia's Pacific Rim after the Second World War within broader global political and economic changes. Specifically, it charts the growth of capitalist economies in the region throughout periodic crises and successive waves of restructuring, and links changes in the world economy to shifts in the domestic political economies of East and Southeast Asia. It suggests that the financial crisis of 1997–98 laid the basis for a new phase of regional economic integration in Pacific-Asia.

Key issues examined include:

• comparison of patterns of state intervention and industrial organization in individual countries
• history of US power in the region
• analysis of class and state-society relations
• how shifts in regional dynamics can effect changes in the world economy.

Through this detailed analysis of regional economic growth and integration since 1945, Capitalist Restructuring and the Pacific Rim concludes that the continued accumulation of capital in East and Southeast Asia is undermining the material foundations of US power.

This comprehensive survey of the emergence of Asia's Pacific Rim will intrigue and inform scholars of Asian Studies, Sociology, and Development Studies alike.

Ravi Arvind Palat is an Associate Professor of Sociology at the State University of New York at Binghamton and has previously taught at the Universities of Hawaii and Auckland.