His presentation was the first in the Political Economy and Development Program's Interuniversity Seminar Series in Comparative Development . The United States is seeking a set of rules that gives almost complete freedom for capital to move across national economies as it wishes, while Europe and Asia favor moves toward capital controls. Wade contends that these profoundly different visions for the global economy will hinder efforts to coordinate an effective response to the crisis.
Disagreement prevails even about the causes of the immediate crisis.
Asian and European experts suggest that it was caused less by structural flaws but rather by surges of capital into Asian economies in the first half of the 1990s, far beyond prudent limits. This action was followed by a panicked exit in the second half of 1997 and into 1998, tearing at the social fabric of societies across the region. In addition to Wade's talk on the crisis, the research program sponsored this fall an informal study group of faculty and students from Brown social science departments. The Interuniversity Seminar Series in Comparative Development is a long-standing series that attracts scholars, researching a wide range of economic and development topics.