ments and is tending to form its own, independent relations. This process has been taking place throughout the 20th century. Between 1870 and 1913 world trade increased by 6% annually. Between 1918 and 1938 there was practically no growth. This can be explained by the slow processes of reconstruction after the First World War, the Great Depression (1929--193) and the self-imposed isolation of the USSR, Germany and a number of other countries. After the Second World War international economic exchange reached it highest level of progress. This was mainly driven by Western Europe, America and Japan. Between 1946 and 1973 world trade was increasing on average by 10% and doubled n volume from 1980--1995. Notwithstanding wars, political confrontation and the accompanying protectionism, the entire period of the 20th century was a time of expansion and global economic strengthening. By resolving their conflicts countries began more and more to see or were forced to see the advantages of the "open" economy and to accept bi-lateral and multi-lateral customs and trade unions. The Genoa conference in 1922 and the World Economic Conference in 1927 are of great significance despite the non-implementation of their decisions as a result of the crisis of 1929 and the Second World War. On the 30th of October 1947 the General Agreement of Trade and Tariffs (GATT) was ratified. This was a milestone leading to the removal of trade discrimination, the consolidation of the principle of "most-favoured nation" status and the formation of customs unions. Between 1964--1967 the "Kennedy round" of talks in which 54 nations took part lead to a 35% reduction in trade tariffs. A further round of talks held in Tokyo in 1979 helped to further develop this process. Together with progress in trade there was also significant progress in economic integration: the complete economic opening of the American states with each other; the German customs union (1871), the Belgium-Luxembourg economic union (1921), the European Iron and Steel Agreement and the Rome Treaty of 1957 on the creation of a Common Market within Europe; the Committee for Economic Cooperation (COMECON) in Eastern Europe (1949) and the European zone for free trade (1960). Despite the political, class and military confrontation of the 20th century there has been a constant process of opening-up and a reduction in the significance of national borders. This has expanded with the ratification of the Latin American Association for Free Trade (LAFTA) in 1960 the Caribbean Common Market (CARICOM) in 1973. At the beginning of the 1990's a new stage in European integration began with the reatification of the Maastricht treaty. The NAFTA agreement on free trade in North America was also signed in 1993. I mention these facts in order to show once again the constant increase in the integrational processes taking place within the entire world. As a result total world trade has grown from 1635 billion USD in 1979 to 1915 billion USD in 1984 to 3667.6 billion USD in 1992. Through the exchange of goods and services the entire world has become linked within a single system. The major factor for integration is the exchange of goods in the area of: -- communications, including satellite television, international telephone links and electronic mail, these advances are particularly significant; -- petrol which despite a marked decline has continued to account for one third of world energy consumption; -- food and raw agricultural products .-- trade with grain, sugar and coffee are amongst the most important factors; -- metals and ore; -- transport and machine building -- planes, cars, ships etc.. the production of which is continuing to increase. A significant new phenomenon in recent decades has been the linking of the financial systems of practically all the countries of the world into a unified system. In the 16--18th century world trade was carried out on the basis of national currencies, gold and silver. During this same period international trade was also based on trade credits and exchange of goods for goods. It was only in the second half of the 19th century that the most industrialised countries accepted the gold standard and the predominance of the British Pound Sterling. Up until the 1930's this system remained, in general terms, in force. Later it was replaced by the Brenton Woods agreement and the domination of the American dollar. At the beginning of the 1970's the Brenton Woods system gave way to floating exchange rates and open financial and currency markets. The predominance of the British Pound was undermined as a result of the reduced importance and the collapse of the British Empire. However, the reason for the changes which took place in the 1970's was the impossibility of any single national currency to monopolise international markets. This is a further demonstration of a common phenomenon, globalisation does not stimulate monopolies but, on the contrary, it creates the conditions for their destruction. In recent decades the world has witnessed the hitherto unseen linkage of countries and nations via currency and financial mechanisms. The replacement of the Brenton Woods system was in fact the removal of the last barriers to the multi-directional fusion of national currencies and exchange rates and to banking and stock exchange operations. Floating exchange rates served as a shock absorber for the resolution of differences and a bridge for overcoming global economic imbalance. During the last 20 years the trade in securities reached previously unknown levels. The trade in international bonds has increased from 76.3 to 167.3 billion dollars[54]. In practice this has meant the growing mutual dependency of capital markets. We can add to this the enormous increase in Euro-dollar markets. After the fall of the Berlin Wall the processes of linkage of the capital markets in all the countries of the world has become undisputed and to a large extent irreversible. Another particulary important indicator of this are the currency policies of practically all the countries in the world. Through a system of mutual convertibility, the maintenance of official reserves in varying currencies and the greater independence of commercial banks, the national economies of countries over the world have become more dependent on each other. After the beginning of the 1970's the international role of the dollar began to subside slowly. This could be seen in the reduction in the size of the official dollar reserves of the industrialised countries to be replaced in the main by the German mark and the Japanese yen. Perhaps the clearest indicator of the economic growth of the Fourth Civilisation is the level of direct investments and the development of trans-national corporations. In the world today there are 37,000 trans-national corporations with over 170,000 branches. Of these, 24,000 corporations are based in the developed countries, 2700 in the developing countries (mainly, South Korea, Hong Kong, Brazil and China) and less than 500 in Central and Eastern Europe. In 1992, the global volume of direct investments reached 2 trillion dollars accounting for a level of sales by the foreign branches of the trans-national corporations of 5.5 trillion dollars.[55] As each year goes by the internationalisation of industry increases which will lead to the intermixing of cultures, manufacturing structures and changes in the awareness of billions of people. Everywhere in the world, the USA or France, Russia or Rumania, Kenya or Ruanda people are becoming more and more aware of the influence of the world economy on their day to day life. Most significantly the houses in which we live and the services which we use are becoming more and more internationalised. I do not know whether it is an exaggeration to say that the modern citizen of the world is a "product of the world". Everywhere in the world, even in the most isolated of countries you will come across cars from the USA, Japan and Germany, household goods from Italy, coffee and fruit from Latin America, electrical goods from Hong Kong and Japan, carpets from Iran or Bulgaria and clothes from China and India etc.. If you take a look at the raw materials used in the production of the finished goods then you will see the labour and the talents of millions of people from many countries. All this might be summed up as two basic phenomena which show the end of one human civilisation and the beginning of another. The first of these phenomena is that the mutual dependence of countries has reached a level at which nation states, autonomous religions and cultures can no longer historically dominate the processes of integration and universal human interests. It is true that the danger of new class, cultural and religious divisions is still possible but the trend towards world integration is becoming more and more irreversible. The new factor is that the most integrated regions in North America, Europe and Japan have created sound economic and financial links with each other. This has also lead to the involvement of all the remaining countries in the world in the global economy. If we take foreign investments as our criteria, we will see that at the beginning of the 1990's the three main economic centres of the world had direct influence over about 50 other satellite countries which accounted for over 3/4 of the world economic product. Today, there is not a single country which can exclude itself from the world economy without causing serious damage to its own development. The attempts by North Korea, Iraq and in the recent past, Albania and Cuba to develop independently in conditions of self-sufficiency have lead to their economic collapse. The huge level of economic inter-dependence in the world has lead to more than just closer integration. When different systems grow closer they form a common, more universal community which is more vital than any individual national or regional, economic or political force. The second phenomenon is the formation of economic forces for which national identity is more formal than essential. Not only in terms of behaviour, interests and structures these forces belong more to the world than to any particular nation state. Above all, these are a part of the trans-national corporations whose economic activities are spread throughout a number of countries and whose connections and dependencies upon national governments are of less significance than, for example, the state of the London Stock Exchange. We could also look at the large number of financial institutions who operate on a global level not as the citizens of any particular country but as citizens of the world. I believe that both the level of mutual economic dependency of countries as well as the several thousand trans-national manufacturing and financial corporations form the economic nucleus of the new civilisation. At the end of the 20th century these structures which control the majority of world manufacturing and trade are the most powerful globalising force in the world. The 20th century was a time when the global world was born but also a time of the creation of supra-national economic structures and the essence of a new civilisation. When I speak of the economic nucleus of the Fourth Civilisation, I mean the influence it has on all areas of life and that the objective changes brought about by the integration of manufacturing and finances have imposed profound changes in the world economic order. 2. NEW GROWTH AND NEW STRUCTURES The trend of the 20th century towards the constant opening-up of national economies will continue at an increasing rate for the next few decades. This will cause the wide-scale redistribution of manufacturing forces and their re-structuring on a branch level. The dynamics of national and world economic growth will be determined more and more by international exchange... T here is not doubt that the globalisation of the world economy is accelerating. According to the predictions of the World Trade Organisation the volume of goods traded in 1995 will increase by 8%. In 1994 this figure was 9.4%. The fact that during the past ten years, world trade has grown faster than the annual global domestic product (see table 8) shows that the integration and opening-up of national borders continues to be a dominant process. Table 8 % annual growth 1984 1985 1986 1987 1988 1989 1990 1991 1992 1993 1994 World Trade 8,0 2,5 4,1 5,3 7,9 6,5 4,5 3,5 4,0 3,5 9,5 World GDP 6,0 2,4 2,8 2,9 4,9 3,4 0,5 -2 -0,5 0,2 2,4 Source: World Trade Organisation. How can this phenomenon be explained? Why for the greater part of the 20th century has world trade been greater than manufacturing? My brief response to these two questions is as follows: the constant growth of world exchange has been caused not only by the growth of manufacturing but also by the cultural and political opening-up of countries, the laws of human progress and technological development. The vast majority of the governments in the countries of the world realise that the effectiveness of their efforts and the wealth of their citizens depends on export and their successful involvement in the international distribution of labour. It has become beneficial not only to exchange newly manufactured products but also those products created in the recent past as well as knowledge, services and personnel. Of particular significance is the difference between the growth of trade and the growth in World Gross Product over the past six years (1990--1995) or since the collapse of the Berlin Wall. There has been a rise in the levels of export from the most developed nations to Eastern Europe and Russia and a continuous increase in the exchange of trade with China. In 1984 alone the progressive Asian economies, including China but with the exception of Japan, achieved a 20% increase in their services trade. There is a simultaneous related increase in Eastern Asia and Central and Eastern Europe. There is no doubt that we are witnessing a new rise in world trade and a reduction in the significance of national borders. If we exclude Africa and the Near East, there is evidence almost everywhere of a growth in world trade and the resulting economic revival. The growth of export is a feature of future change in the structure of product manufacture. The most dynamic group of new products in recent years has been telecommunications and office equipment. I believe that telecommunications will continue to increase their share of world trade and will be the most dynamic and profitable export area. This will result in increased communications between people and the intermixing of cultures and manufacture in the world. Telecommunications are a symbol of the Fourth Civilisation and the main technological channel for its development. Clearly telecommunications will continue to contribute to the re-structuring of social life and the stimulation of growth, the opening-up of the world and the linkage of millions and billions of people. The main integrational effect will be the linking of the new communications technologies to televisions and computer technology. The American media group "Time Warner" has already developed and begun to market the first digital interactive television network in the world. Their "Full Service Network" permits its subscribers to carry out banking operations from home, to receive information about products, services and events, to buy and to order and to see new films etc.. Consumers' choice is guaranteed. However, at the same time, this allows the television companies to guarantee their monopoly of the market. Whatever happens in the future, there is little doubt that telecommunications will continue to expand their share of world trade and be a key factor in economic development and structural and social changes. Together with world finance which has developed as a result of improved world communications, telecommunications will continue to be the most attractive area of the world economy. The Internet has allowed tens of millions of people over the entire world have become part of a single network of communications and access to information. Computer networks will lead to revolutionary changes in finances, trade and manufacturing. Despite certain serious predictions concerning a fall in profits from manufacture and sale of aeroplanes[56], I believe that all modern forms of transport will continue to grow dynamically. People of different races, ethnic groups and cultures are coming closer to one another, running to embrace each other. They are beginning to realise how useful it is to travel together and to meet and use the experience of others. The conclusion which seems to suggest itself is that the branches of the Fourth Civilisation (telecommunications, finances, services, computers, information technology, transport, services etc..) have made life more integrated and are a product of the new inter-dependency which is required by humanity. The process will not stop here. On the basis of these key branches of the New Civilisation, still more, newer, branches will be formed. Television and telephones will spur the creation of new audio-visual telephones. Paging systems and mobile telephones will become cheaper and will allow parents to have more control over their children and to gain information from their teachers. Doctors and policemen will be called to where they are needed. This will change politics and management. It will ease and change ways of voting. There is already software available for conducting trade over the computer with full legal support. In ancient times peoples were separated from one another by years of travel. In the Middle Ages the distance shortened to months. In modern times distances can be covered in days. In the New Civilisation the whole of humanity is connected within hours, minutes and seconds. I recently had to fly from Sofia to Honolulu by Lufthansa and United Airlines. I covered the distance in 15--16 hours. Twenty time zones to the other side of the globe in 16 hours! I am convinced that in the Fourth Civilisation people will be able to circumnavigate the world in less time. Despite the opinions of certain sceptics I am sure that transport will continue to improve and develop with leaps and bounds. This applies to car manufacturing, aeroplane construction, shipbuilding and certain other completely new forms of transport. This will also provide new prospects for world economic growth. New technologies will continue to stimulate this growth and the dynamic processes will never stop despite the critics who believe that the computer and audio-visual market are already satiated. The limits of high technology growth and integrational products have not yet been reached. It is not certain whether this growth will dominate the world economy as a whole. It is most likely that the next 10--20 years will be years of technological progress but also slow reconstruction. The lack of manageability and even elementary order within the world economy means that it is not clear which of the two will gain the upper hand. Above all this requires the replacement of old industrial production with new technology, a process which has been in progress for the past 15 years. This process, however, should not be perceived as the elementary replacement of the "factory chimney with the computer", as some philosophers believe. The old industrial sectors (metallurgy, chemicals, machine tool engineering, energy production, transport) will be partially reconstructed, partially relocated to the lesser developed countries for the sake of cheaper labour and the lack of environmental pressure groups and opposition. One only has to look to see what is happening with the automobile industry, machine tool production, electronics and the electronics industry and chemical production. Everything now involves new high technology and computers. In modern automobile construction as much money is now spent on new electronics as on improvements to engine design. The new generation of aeroplanes, "Boeing" and "Airbus" are practically operated from the ground taking off and landing using electronic equipment, while the pilots fulfil mainly regulatory functions. The chemical industry is re-orienting itself to new, environmentally clean technology and hitherto unknown products. The construction industry is investing more and more in new highly resistant materials. Just as in the 19th and 20th century the industrial revolution lead to revolutions in agriculture without replacing it, the new technology of the New Civilisation will revolutionise industrial technology and will change their essence but will not destroy it. Development does not allow for absolute rejection. Revolution itself always means the addition of the new to the old and its transformation. It has been interpreted in other ways in history, but that was just destruction. The second very important area in the restructuring of the world economy, in my opinion, is the huge process of the geographical re-distribution of world production. Today, the citizens, trade unions and politicians in Bavaria and California are concerned about the re-location of manufacturing facilities to the countries of South East Asia and Latin America. Millions of people are suffering as a result of the reduction in military production, as is the case in California. This fact cannot be ignored, but this is only the beginning. The modern geographical distribution of world production was formed at a time of colonial power and consolidated during the bi-polar world. Given the new world conditions of the Fourth Civilisation, things will have to change out of all recognition. As paradoxical as it may sound even the direction of investments will have to change. Amongst the favourites are the countries of South East Asia. The export of manufacturing potential from North America and Europe will expand. This will consist mainly of those products which can be easily adapted to the new technologies and the constant increase in the cost of labour in the industrialised countries. Finally, the advent of the New Civilisation will be accompanied by the closure of a number of manufacturing processes. This process will be more intense than at any other time during the whole of the 20th century. Whether we live in New York, Tokyo, Belgrade or Dakkar we are living in a state of transition between two civilisations. This is a technological transition, a transition in the nature of economic development. New manufacturing sectors and products will come to the fore. The distinct division between intellectual and physical labour and the manufacturing and non-manufacturing sector will disappear. This is indisputable and supported not only by P.Drucker but also by the chairman of the majority in the US Congress N.Greenwich. The state of change is indeed similar to that which existed at the end of the 18th century and the beginning of the 19th. Let us hope that the consequences for the people of the world will not be as dramatic as they were then. During the processes of industrialisation millions of people were thrown out onto the streets or transformed into factory slaves. The developed societies were divided into classes causing huge social unrest. Today the experience of the past and the bitter lessons of the 20th century provide us with the hope that the great changes in technological and economic growth will not inevitably lead to chaos and social strife. 3. WHO WILL DOMINATE THE WORLD ECONOMY Recently, everyone has been trying to convince us that the three economic centres -- the USA, Japan and Europe dominate the world and that the technological and financial power of Japan will replace the economic power of the East. I do not believe in these prospects... D uring the Third Civilisation the power of countries was determined by their military and political power. This was based on economic strength but was not always the most decisive element in the consolidation of power of one country over another. The Ottoman Empire was not more advanced materially when between the 13--16th centuries it conquered one third of Europe as far north as Vienna. France under Napoleon the 1st was no stronger economically than the rest of the countries in Europe but managed to conquer with better military organisation and leadership. The Fourth Civilisation precludes the military resolution of conflicts. The achievement of nuclear parity and the nature of nuclear weapons makes it absurd to wage nuclear war. This is also true conventional conflicts as well. Let us take the example of the war in Bosnia. There have been over 200,000 deaths (perhaps many more), the complete destruction of industry and infrastructure, valleys of blood and violence. The war ended with the signing of the peace accord in Dayton, USA which brought the sides back to their starting points. The reason for such absurdities is the potential possibility of the mutual neutralisation of the nuclear powers and their influence on the smaller warring countries. I begin this chapter in this way since in the 1960's and 1970's when nuclear parity was achieved a "new concept" of world economic domination was born. There are still people in a number of countries who believe that the USA or Japan can play the role of a world economic super power. In the 20th century many countries have aspired to such a role but all of them lost in the long run. I believe that today on the basis of the laws of human development the imposition of economic domination by one country or a group of countries over the rest can only be a temporary state. In the context of globalisation the economic levels of the countries of the world have begun to level out. This process can only be stopped by political coercion or the isolation of countries from each other. In the civilisations which have existed up until now, nations began their development in different climatic conditions and with different resources. In the 19th and 20th centuries these same nations began to realise how wide was the gap had grown between them. During the last 50 years a series of processes began to take place within the heart of the bi-polar model which proved that economic domination from an historical point of view is purely illusory. Let us take as an example the most powerful institutions of the world economy, the trans-national corporations. Immediately after the Second World War the American corporations were the undisputed dominating forces of the world economy and only a group of British companies managed to upset their hegemony. In 1962 of the 500 largest companies in the world, 300 (with a total product of 365 billion dollars) were in the USA and 200 (with a total product of 174 billion USD) in other countries. Today this picture has changed beyond recognition. In 1992, of the 50 largest industrial companies in the world, only 14 were in the USA, 13 in Japan, 2 in the U.K., 7 in Germany, 3 in Italy, 5 in France, 2 in South Korea etc.. This trend will continue. We can expect a serious increase in trans-national companies from Germany, Russia, South Korea, Brazil and also a number of smaller countries. The process of levelling will take place slowly. This is the inevitable result of the opening and expansion of the world market. In contrast to 40 or 50 years ago, today investments, manufacturing processes and goods are being exported everywhere it is economically viable to do so. At the beginning of the new technological revolution in the 1970's and 1980's investments were directed at the most developed nations which had educated and well-trained personnel. I believe that since the 1990's a significant part of the world investments will be redirected mainly to some of the new "dragons" of South East Asia, Australia, China, Latin America and, given greater political stability, Eastern Europe. Similar changes are taking place in the commodity and stock markets. Only a few years ago the stock exchanges in New York and London were dominant. Today the Tokyo stock exchange has changed all that and is now quite convincingly the leading stock market in the world. There has been a gradual, almost invisible process whereby the new financial markets have developed. This will lead to the re-distribution of the economic power and new hitherto unseen trends. Until the end of the 1980's and in particular during the period of the Cold War, the major criterion for political and economic power was still closely associated with the military and armaments industry. If the positive trends of world development continue economic power will depend more on technology, information and resources and will guarantee the future of promising industrial sectors. This will lead to the re-determination of the power and wealth of the countries and nations of the world and their place in the global division of labour. The new technologies will not permit monopolisation. They will guarantee advantages for the countries which possess them only until they are mastered by other countries. High technology in the modern world is being spread via the trans-national corporations and the activities of governments. Japan, despite its world domination in the development and production of new technology is also a major exporter of high-tech products and know-how. In South East Asia and Latin America there are number of production facilities with the most modern telecommunications technology. Competition between the trans-national corporations is the main reason for this. I believe that this is in principle impossible for technology and information to be monopolised in the aims of the domination of certain countries over others especially in the context of the modern scientific and technological revolution. The New Civilisation will still maintain the trend of the free movement of technology and information. The direct result of this is the formation over the past 30--40 years of a new global distribution of manufacturing and technological priorities. Each of the developed countries to a certain extent have found their market niches and has established itself in world export. For example at the beginning of the 1970's the USA exported 77.5% of world aeroplane production; 44.1% of organic chemicals; 55.9% of office equipment; 35.2% of computer technology; 39.3% of industrial refrigeration; 35.8% of grain and 37.1% of steel export etc.. In 1985 Germany accounted for 23.2% of world automobile export; 19.8% of plastics; 51.5% of rotary printing presses; 32.4% of synthetic organic dies; 34.1% of packaging equipment; 30.4% of textile and leather processing machinery. In the same years, 1985, Japan possessed 30.8% of world automobile export; 37.5% of lorries and trucks; 80.7% of televisions and tape recorders; 82% of motorcycles; 62.2% of cameras and video-cameras; 55.7% of microphones and amplifiers; 37.9% of peripheral electronic equipment and 31.7% of tankers etc.. It is interesting that during the same period a number of smaller countries achieved significant levels of long-term exports. For example Sweden accounted for 41.7% of the world export of paper and boxes; 17.2% of centrifuges; 15.5% of sulphate cellulose. The Swiss accounted for 45.1% of textile looms; 34% of wrist watches; 25.3% of synthetic dies and 20.6% of herbicides.[57] Another criterion is the state of the available natural resources in a given country and whether they can exert influence on the power and strength of countries and their role in the world economy. The freer the exchange of goods, services and labour the more open countries become to each other. In this case the power of countries will be determined by their total national wealth based not only the existing manufacturing facilities but also on the available natural resources. On the basis of this logic, in September 1995 the World Bank published an analysis of the ecologically sustainable development and the natural resources of the countries of the world. Accordance to their classification of the available national wealth per head of population (table 9) Australia came out in first place followed by Canada, Luxembourg, Switzerland and Japan. The USA was quite far down the list in 12th place and Germany in 15th. Other countries with enormous reserves of natural resources such as Russia, Brazil, Argentina and others are outside the classification due to their low levels of existing production facilities and human resources. The methodology of the World Bank is flawless: resources are of benefit when there is an adequate material base and human resources. On the other hand, those countries who do not have such resources will have to pay for them and to compensate for the inequity with more labour and technology. Table 9 Classification of the 15 leading countries on the basis of national wealth per head of population. State Wealth per head of population Sources of national wealth % population capital assets natural resources Australia Canada Luxemburg Switzerland Japan Sweden Iceland Qatar UAE Denmark Norway USA France Kuwait Germany 835 704 658 647 565 496 486 473 471 463 424 421 413 405 399 21 22 83 78 81 56 23 51 65 76 48 59 77 62 79 7 9 12 19 18 16 16 11 14 17 22 16 17 9 17 71 69 4 3 2 29 61 39 21 7 30 25 7 29 4 Source: World Bank, 1985 These figures show the constant increase in the number of countries with an established position in the global division of labour. There are at least 30 countries with a high level of economic potential and another 60 or 70 with the potential to join them in the next 30 or 40 years. Most significantly, in the current situation no one country can impose a monopoly on another. The USA, Europe and Japan are inter-dependent on each other. Their mutual dependence is unilateral and is not only between the three established economic centres. As a result of structural reforms in the world economy, there is a whole group of countries aspiring to reach the levels of the top three and as a result of narrow specialisation and resources they will soon catch up with them. Is it then true that economic power will move from the USA and Europe to Japan? A number of academics seem to believe this. I believe that this is possible but that it will be a short-term and limited trend. The reason is that the global market is now strongly influenced by significant market forces which are capable of balancing out the economic levels of the country. Only with strong protectionism or as a result of political cataclysm will one country or another be able to reach a situation of monopoly or privilege. During the entire period of the 20th century only as a result of political and military conflicts has one or a group of nations been able to establish such a position of privilege which has transformed it into a political force. This time is over. No-one any longer recognises the legality of protectionism or uses political arguments in the resolution of ordinary economic issues. The choice is great and the competition offers better alternatives. Manufacturers and merchants in the whole world are forcing their governments to remove prohibitions and limitations. There is a number of cases where the opposite is true, for example the European agricultural policies and the limitations on import into Japan. However, no-one can be convinced of the strategic benefit of such policies. The Fourth Civilisation offers simultaneously the gradual approximation of economic levels and the creation of similar, equitable conditions for economic activity and the mutual conditionality of these two processes. The 20th century opened the way for this process which is irreversible whatever difficulties the transition might bring. Despite the influence of Japanese commercial, manufacturing and investment expansion and despite the fact that in the 1970's and 1980's Japan was the most dynamic economic force in the world, I believe it will not be remain single most powerful leader of the world economy. The economic dynamics of South Eastern Asia will continue but this will give rise to a reverse wave of investments to other regions and countries. It is true that in the last 15 years the USA has lost a part of its share of the world market and Japan has increased its market share by 15%. The American share of the heavy machinery market has fallen from 25% to 5% in 30 years while Japan has increased its share from 0% to 22%[58]. However, even this cannot convince me that this process will continue to develop unilaterally and that the Japanese economy will dominate while the American economy will flounder as this was once predicted by the former director of the European Bank, Jacques Atalie. I am writing these lines early in the morning in perhaps one of the least American and the most Japanese of the United States of the America. I can see through my window the waking lights of the beautiful capital city and perhaps one of the most beautiful places in the world. My first impression is that the atmosphere is mainly Asian and in particular Japanese. Only the liberal spirit of the USA could allow for the mass concentration of Japanese, Chinese, Korean and Vietnamese influences in a single, albeit island, state. It is here that I can understand the arguments in favour of another type of thinking, that the majority of the older Asian immigrants as well as the new arrivals consider themselves to be Americans or at least citizens of the world and that Honolulu has become a bridge between the USA and Japan and that it is such bridges which create a balanced market. Japan and the smaller Asian "dragons" cannot become the masters of the world. However, they have indisputably destroyed the economic, technological and financial monopoly of the Atlantic countries of the USA and Europe. They have created conditions for a completely new distribution of world manufacturing production and hitherto unknown geo-economic structures. In the 19th century Britain and France and eventually Germany dominated the world. During the first half of the 20th century the USA and the USSR caught up and eventually became the world leaders in a bi-polar world. Between 19