Australian Left Review
Article Title
An Australian perspective on the new international economic order
Abstract
After 1945 there was a global restructuring of capital investment and production. It was designed to rebuild the ex-enemy powers of the USA in order to contain communism and to defend US hegemony over the world capitalist system until such time as interimperialist rivalry no longer made this tenable. The underpinnings o f the strategy were hundreds o f US military bases, massive US economic aid to Europe, Taiwan and South Korea and a series o f international agreements regulating the international flow of trade and payments. Foremost among these were the Bretton Woods Agreement, the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade (GATT) and the establishment of the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund (IMF).