This thesis is about the provisioning of development assistance, as a major component of foreign aid. Conventional approaches to the subject have tended to focus on the determinate interactions of discrete agents as the principle units of analysis. This necessarily obscures the functional role development assistance fulfills in relation to the global politico economic order, however. This study, by contrast, properly situates individual programs of development assistance as belonging to a much larger historical pattern, or system of coordinated politico-economic behavior. The objective, therefore, is to apprehend the systematic and functional interrelations existing (i) among the various agents engaged in the transfer of assistance, on the one hand, and (ii) between these institutions and organizations as an aggregate and the global order itself, on the other. ‘Regime analysis’ is utilized as the preferred method of analysis. The basis of the argument is that the regime for the provision of development assistance functions as a regulative-control mechanism, ancillary to the prevailing economic arrangements and relations within the global political economy. Altogether, I argue that regime apparatuses have been configured so as to (i) forestall cataclysmic instabilities in the global politico economic order, and (ii) to induce compliance among developing nations to the order’s organizing principles and-or logic. This is revealed in phases in the liberalization and-or illiberalization of access to external financing over different global-historical epochs and during periods and in contexts of either instability or stability. I find that during periods and in contexts of instability, development assistance has been initiated or expanded in geo-strategic ways so as to regenerate markets and, thereby, obviate, or thwart the anticipated metastasization of adversarial politico-economic organizational frameworks. During periods and in contexts of relative stability, conversely, I find that the provision of development assistance becomes contracted, or made less expansive, as well as increasingly driven by conditionalities. Consequently, the functioning of the regime structurally conditions the developmental orientations and prospects of peripheral nations and regions and, thereby, also contributes to the overall evolution of the global politico-economic order.

This thesis is about the provisioning of development assistance, as a major component of foreign aid. Conventional approaches to the subject have tended to focus on the determinate interactions of discrete agents as the principle units of analysis. This necessarily obscures the functional role development assistance fulfills in relation to the global politico economic order, however. This study, by contrast, properly situates individual programs of development assistance as belonging to a much larger historical pattern, or system of coordinated politico-economic behavior. The objective, therefore, is to apprehend the systematic and functional interrelations existing (i) among the various agents engaged in the transfer of assistance, on the one hand, and (ii) between these institutions and organizations as an aggregate and the global order itself, on the other. ‘Regime analysis’ is utilized as the preferred method of analysis. The basis of the argument is that the regime for the provision of development assistance functions as a regulative-control mechanism, ancillary to the prevailing economic arrangements and relations within the global political economy. Altogether, I argue that regime apparatuses have been configured so as to (i) forestall cataclysmic instabilities in the global politico economic order, and (ii) to induce compliance among developing nations to the order’s organizing principles and-or logic. This is revealed in phases in the liberalization and-or illiberalization of access to external financing over different global-historical epochs and during periods and in contexts of either instability or stability. I find that during periods and in contexts of instability, development assistance has been initiated or expanded in geo-strategic ways so as to regenerate markets and, thereby, obviate, or thwart the anticipated metastasization of adversarial politico-economic organizational frameworks. During periods and in contexts of relative stability, conversely, I find that the provision of development assistance becomes contracted, or made less expansive, as well as increasingly driven by conditionalities. Consequently, the functioning of the regime structurally conditions the developmental orientations and prospects of peripheral nations and regions and, thereby, also contributes to the overall evolution of the global politico-economic order.

This thesis explores migrant labor in South-East Asia by addressing the topic of migration, specifically its causes and consequences. Indonesia, Malaysia, and Singapore are countries that experienced rapid industrialization from the mid-1960s throughout the 1990s. Simultaneously, the migration of people within the region increased. A key focus is how regional development has contributed to migration flows and to the position of migrants in these countries. Using a migration systems framework from Castles' and Miller's The Age of Migration (2003) that draws on theoretical elements from economics, historical-structuralism and transnationalism, this thesis finds that several factors explain the causes of migration in Indonesia, Malaysia, and Singapore and the lasting implications migration had in their respective societies. Both macro- and micro-structures influenced industrialization and a migratory labor market. The historical, political, and economic linkages shared among the countries, alongside regional integration and attractive government-led industrialization strategies contributed to large-scale flows of migrant workers within the region. These same factors made migration and settlement increasingly difficult. Consequently, human rights violations of migrants in these countries became more pronounced. Singapore's dominance of Indonesia and Malaysia in the semi-periphery of South-East Asia conditioned the environment that migrants faced in their host societies. Migrant workers from Indonesia and Malaysia enjoyed better treatment in Singapore, because of its targeted labor, immigration, and social policies. In all three countries, settlement patterns of migrant workers were virtually similar to government commitments to prevent assimilation.