The Great Wars and the Post-war Consensus 1914–1979

Abstract

This chapter will discuss the post-World War I years the last time the USA refused to play a more activist role in international relations and its government was mired in economic orthodoxy. I will assess the problems in international capitalism that started just prior to the Great Depression, as well as the major reorganization of the international system that occurred after the Second World War. Then, I will discuss the post-war order constructed by the United States as well as instituional structures and barriers put in place during the period of so-called embedded liberalism, where free trade was promoted, but finance was highly regulated. This chapter will also discuss the major economic and geopolitical conflicts of the Cold War, including the Korean and Vietnam wars. From there I will examine the origins of the decline of the Bretton Woods system of capital control and the rise of the neoliberalism in the 1980s. It will also outline the origins of the globalization of finance in the 1970s, which accelerated during the 1980s and 1990s.