Abstract One 2000

GLOBAL

DEVELOPMENT STUDIES

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Volume Two Winter 1999-Spring 2000 Numbers 1-2.

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THEME: CARIBBEAN DEVELOPMENT STRATEGIES: ISSUES AND OPTIONS

THE "SHAMBLES" IN THE WEST INDIES

Jay R. Mandle

W. Bradford Wiley Professor of Economics

Colgate University

Hamilton, New York 13346

Published Online: December 15, 2016

ABSTRACT

None of the participants in the debates of the 1960s and 1970s concerning the economic development of the Caribbean could have foreseen how changes in information processing, communications, and transportation would integrate world capital and product markets. These technologies of globalization have resulted in an enhanced opportunity for Third World countries to participate effectively in the global economy. In turn, this has facilitated the development process, particularly in East Asia. This article reviews the obstacles to doing the same in the Caribbean and concludes that not even Trinidad and Tobago, the region's leading participant in the global economy, possesses sufficient human capital and physical infrastructure to ensure success in the new global economic environment.