None of the affected nations, except Malaysia, has tried to isolate itself from the global economy, and the widely feared worldwide wave of protectionism has not yet materialized. Nor has there been the great rethinking of economic globalization that some feared and others advocated. The critics of global capitalism pounced on the crisis as proof of globalization's fatal flaws. Partly as a result of the crisis, a new consensus is rapidly emerging. It is an elaboration of the original consensus, not a new departure.
Some economists still have problems with the new consensus.
Dani Rodrik of Harvard University argues, for instance, that openness to trade and investment is not enough to ensure economic development, and that strong social and political institutions are more important. But such views do not depart as far from the conventional wisdom as they once did. Economists at the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development in Paris, a bastion of international free-market thinking, would agree with much of what people like Mr. Rodrik say. OECD economists have certainly never said that openness by itself would guarantee economic development. But they do insist that openness to the outside world has become a key element in any developing country success story, especially now that technological know-how, usually acquired from other countries, is ever more essential for business profits.