Global Organization and Developing Countries: Current Aspects of Neo-mercantilism and the Global Framework of Accumulation

Abstract

The world economy consists of a set of relations between economic centres of interest and power (commercial, technological and financial), both political and military, of unequal strengths. The structures of domestic and international markets are determined by antagonistic relations (confrontations and pacts) between such national centres (states and firms). The institutions and big firms of industrialized countries shape world markets through competition while the weakest economies suffer violent fluctuations in prices as well as fluctuations in financial markets or raw material prices.