A V Rajwade: Unintended consequences

WORLD MONEY

As oil prices have shot up, and transportation costs have mounted, buyers are reviewing their supply chains with a view to making them shorter. At some stage, mounting transportation costs could prove a threat to closer integration of the global economy. The possibility of a Democratic administration in the US is of course another negative factor for globalisation. But first an overview of what has happened.

According to the opponents of globalisation, it was a conspiracy for economic domination of the world by finance capitalists from New York and London. In the event, looking back over the last three decades, the developments have been quite the contrary, once again proving how difficult a job forecasting ("particularly about the future" as Groucho Marx once said) is, how the law of unintended consequences remains in full force.

Consider a few, not very representative, but striking, developments:

In the mid-80s, India opposed the inclusion of services in the Uruguay Round. Today, we have a globally super-competitive IT industry