The bark is worse than the bite: New WTO law and late industrialization

In spite of (or because of?) the successful industrialization of leading la tecomers under a set of institutions that had deviated from free-market nor ms, by the 1990s the global economic order had formed around rather orthodo x neoliberal principles. At close examination, however, the new rules of th e World Trade Organization, a symbol of neoliberalism, are flexible and all ow countries to continue to promote their industries under the banner of pr omoting science and technology. The success formula of late industrializati on-allocating subsidies in exchange for monitorable, result-oriented perfor mance standards-is still condoned. The problems bedeviling latecomers today are not formal legal constraints but informal political pressures exerted by North Atlantic economies in favor of radical market opening. Latecomers lack a vision to guide them in responding to this pressure.