Disruption - by Michael de Groot (Hardcover)

About the Book

Book Synopsis

In Disruption, Michael De Groot argues that the global economic upheaval of the 1970s was decisive in ending the Cold War. Both the West and the Soviet bloc struggled with the slowdown of economic growth; chaos in the international monetary system; inflation; shocks in the commodities markets; and the emergence of offshore financial markets. The superpowers had previously disseminated resources to their allies to enhance their own national security, but the disappearance of postwar conditions during the 1970s forced Washington and Moscow to choose between promoting their own economic interests and supporting their partners in Europe and Asia.

De Groot shows that new unexpected macroeconomic imbalances in global capitalism sustained the West during the following decade. Rather than a creditor nation and net exporter, as it had been during the postwar period, the United States became a net importer of capital and goods during the 1980s that helped fund public spending, stimulated economic activity, and lubricated the private sector. The United States could now live beyond its means and continue waging the Cold War, and its allies benefited from access to the booming US market and the strengthened US military umbrella. As Disruption demonstrates, a new symbiotic economic architecture powered the West, but the Eastern European regimes increasingly became a burden to the Soviet Union. They were drowning in debt, and the Kremlin no longer had the resources to rescue them.

Review Quotes

Overall, Disruption is an informed effort to interpret the geo-economic competition of the two political and socio-economic systems, with a glimpse into the complexity of history.

De Groot's readers will be rewarded from studying this dense and engaging book with its cutting-edge analysis of the crisis of Bretton Woods in 1971 through the ripple effects of dept-driven development that followed the 1979 Volcker Shock.

De Groot meticulously introduces the model by which the Soviet Union provided Warsaw Pact signatories with natural resources at prices well below those on the global markets, to enable their production of goods, which were generally inferior to those offered by Western counterparts.

Disruption enlarges and enhances readers' understanding of the end of the Cold War With thorough research and clear explanation, De Groot demonstrates why, by the late 1960s, the US and the USSR could no longer finance an international economic system founded on Cold War principles. Essential reading for advanced undergraduates through faculty.

About the Author

Michael De Groot is Assistant Professor of International Studies at Indiana University Bloomington.