The Economics of Intervention: American Overseas Investments and Relations with Underdeveloped Areas, 1890–1950

This essay has presented a framework for the analysis of economic factors in political relations between developed and developing areas. The most relevant considerations in this regard are the potential costs of imperial intervention in enhancing the return to metropolitan economic interests, and the potential benefits that intervention might bring to these interests. The essay has emphasized the differential political implications of various types of metropolitan economic activity, and especially of different forms of foreign investment.