This essay attempts to understand the role of economic power in shaping the world since the Second World War. It focuses on the main strand of economic developments over this period, separated from looking at subsidiary processes related to the Cold War, détente or the UK-US economic competition in mid-1960's because from the economic point of view, these processes were put in the shade by the much bigger magnitudes of capital flows in the West and among the oil producers.

The study begins with the European Recovery Programme, or the Marshall Plan ......