Economic Growth in Emerging Market Countries

Abstract

Emerging markets are important for global economic growth. In the post-crisis era, they played a vital role in global economic recovery. However, frequent financial turmoil in emerging markets over the years exposed flaws with the economic structures and financial markets of these countries. This articledescribes the overall economic conditions and structures of emerging markets and analyzes the driving forces of economic growth. It is established that emerging markets, especially of Asian countries, contributed significantly to the global economic growth over the last few decades. The main drivers of economic growth vary among the emerging markets. While some countries rely on energy resources, others have their economic growth driven by cheap labor and high savings. Meanwhile, emerging markets with rapid and stable economic growth over a long period of time have some characteristics in common. For example, they all carefully manage the opening-up processes. The articlealso investigates the major problems that emerging economies encounter in economic development. For example, the overreliance on the global market makes some countries vulnerable to external shocks; the fragile domestic financial market leads to frequent financial crises; the improper economic structure makes some countries excessively dependent on foreign markets; and some countries are stuck in economic stagnation.