LINEAGES OF LIBERALISM AND MIRACLES OF MODERNIZATION - THE WORLD-BANK, THE EAST-ASIAN TRAJECTORY AND THE INTERNATIONAL DEVELOPMENT DEBATE

Until recently the World Bank, arguably the most prestigious and one o f the most powerful producers of international development knowledge, played an important role in encouraging the perception that the East A sian trajectory was a veritable miracle of capitalist development. Thi s article begins with a brief discussion of the changes in the World B ank's understanding of development over the past 30 or 40 years. This is followed by an examination of the Bank's efforts to accommodate the East Asian trajectory within the dominant Anglo-American narrative on international development. It is argued that, in the context of the s hifting contours of the international political economy and of importa nt changes to the dominant international discourse on development, the World Bank has played a crucial role in domesticating the East Asian Miracle to the dominant Liberal narrative of progress and in facilitat ing the wider reinvention of liberalism in the post-1945 period.