Malaysia and Thailand as Asia's new tigers

Today a new center of the world economy is emerging in the Asia-Pacific region. Since the middle of the 20th century the dynamic Asian economies have achieved very remarkable results in overcoming backwardness and created industrial potential that allows them to compete with China Japan the EU and the USA on the world market. Among the newly industrializing countries in Asia the four small tigers (South Korea Taiwan Singapore and Hong Kong) were initially the furthest along the path of catching up with the West. In addition to them however another group of advanced countries called new tigers including Malaysia Thailand Indonesia and the Philippines has emerged. In this group Malaysia and Thailand have implemented the most successful modernization strategies. The author analyzes the main characteristics of political and economic development of these two countries at the present stage.