The current global financial crisis frequently is presented by many apologists as an unprecedented, unexpected, and unpredictable chain of events and outcomes that developed rapidly. Other members of the culpable apologist flock paint the current global financial crisis as an aberration, an event at the polar extreme of outcomes associated with the functioning of the business cycle, or as a chain of events and outcomes resulting from irresponsible consumers and home-buyers that were spurred on by governmental policies. All of these portrayals of the current global financial crisis put forward by the apologists for the actual casual agents of the chain of events are designed to attain specific objectives (Bayne, 2008; Economist Intelligence Unit, 2008; Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development, 2008). These objectives are to deflect responsibility and accountability from the perpetrators, prevent the implementation of policies that will prevent recurrence by increasing oversight and regulation of the financial sector, and transfer current and future wealth from ordinary people to the financial sector entities, their managements, and their investors to offset financial sector losses.
None of attributions by the apologists, as discussed above, is true. Attainment of all of the objectives sought by the apologists, as discussed above, must be prevented. Each of these goals is especially important for small open economies (Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development, 2008; Reddy, 2008; Stiglitz, 2001).
Small open economies are particularly vulnerable to the dangers associated with chains of events and outcomes such as those that characterize the current global financial crisis. The globalization of economic, business, and financial activity provide opportunities for enhanced economic growth and development for small open economies. The same factors, however, expose small open economies to si...