For dozens of developing countries, the financial upheavals of the 1980s have set back economic development by a decade or more. Poverty in those countries has intensified as they struggle under the burden of an enormous external debt. In 1988, more than six years after the onset of the crisis,...

Regional economic arrangements such as free trade areas (FTAs), customs unions, and currency blocs, have become increasingly prevalent in the world economy. Both pervasive and controversial, regionalization has some economists optimistic about the opportunities it creates and others fearful that...