Trade, the engine of growth in East Asia

The Newly Industrializing Countries (NICs) of the Pacific Basin - Taiwan, South Korea, Hong Kong, and Singapore - differ in many ways. Each has its own language, culture, political life, and economic system. But there is one crucial characteristic they all hold in common: each has succeeded in defying in what Peter C.Y. Chow and Mitchell Kellman define as a "vicious circle of poverty" following World War II. In Trade - The Engine of Growth in East Asia, the authors provide a comprehensive analysis of the economic factors which fueled the "engine of growth." They combine a detailed body of empirical data with an unusually broad theoretical framework to highlight the factors in each industry and market which contributed to the success of these countries. The work examines and forecasts potential competition from the surrounding geographic area. It also contrasts the development of the NICs with Japan, with "next tier NICs," and with each other in a variety of markets, including those of the United States and the increasingly unified Europe. Using modern economic theory and sophisticated quantitative techniques, Trade - The Engine of Growth in East Asia will enable scholars, students, policymakers, and professionals to understand the success of these East Asian models of growth.

Beyond its central premise, the book can be read through the connected lenses of Nonfiction. Those themes offer useful points of attention as the characters, ideas, or world develop, especially where the book complicates the expectations of its primary category.