From the Millennium to Global Development Goals

From 1000 AD to 1800 AD, Asia, Africa and Latin America-comprising today’s developing countries-accounted for 65-75 percent of world population and income. China and India dominated the world economy and Turkey dominated the Islamic world. Europe surged to world dominance through the industrial, transport and communications revolutions, and the ideology and practice of colonialism. Nostalgic imperial revisionism about the spread of civilization notwithstanding, between 1870 and 1950 Asia’s per capita income plummeted from onehalf of Western European levels to one-tenth.1 Developing countries have been bouncing back since 1950. As a consequence, a much-needed global rebalancing-economic, political, and even moral-is in train. The normative thrust of this chapter is to promote social democracy and market economics in the developing countries for inclusive, representative and empowering governance with built-in accountability mechanisms.