Economic Globalization

Economic globalization is characterized by the growing interdependence of national economies around the globe (Dollar 2005). Increase in economic interdependence refers to the expansion of cross-border trade, international investment and migration. In the twenty first century national economic development is hardly possible without integration into the global economy.

As a matter of fact developed countries have been dominating the process of economic globalization and are used to be seen as its main driving force. Thus, in the mid-90s developed countries were responsible for nearly 82% of the total value of cross-border trade in the whole world in addition to over 80% of the world’s total value of foreign direct investment (FDI) (Shangquan 2000). Consequently, developed countries such as the United Kingdom, Germany, Japan and the United States are marked as the largest winners of economic globalization. The process of economic globalization, in its turn, has resulted in an expansion of the gap between the prosperous North and the destitute South. The “great divergence” which splits the world into the rich and poor countries since the nineteenth century was defined as a “dominant feature of the modern economic history” (Rodik, 2003). However, during the last two decades the developing countries seem to have significantly revised settled state of economic affairs.

The current process of economic globalization is characterized by a pronounced acceleration of growth in