The lecture and discussion with one of the world’s most renowned and influential economists, Branko Milanović, is centered around his latest book, The Great Global Transformation: The United States, China, and the Remaking of the World Economic Order. In it, the author examines global economic processes that have unfolded over the past fifty years and which, he argues, will profoundly shape the world in the decades to come.

According to Milanović, these developments stem primarily from the economic and technological rise of Asia in relation to the rest of the world, and particularly in relation to the global West. First, Asia’s growth shifted the center of global production toward the Pacific. At the same time, China’s rise intensified geopolitical competition with the United States, both within Asia and on a global scale. At the individual level, the improved material position of the Asian middle class contributed to the relative decline of segments of the Western middle class within the global income hierarchy, resulting in the most significant shift in income distribution since the Industrial Revolution. Consequently, these economic transformations generated political reactions that have profoundly shaken the political order of Western democracies.

Introductory remarks: Ivica Mladenović (IFDT)

Discussant: Filip Balunović (IFDT)