IT WAS THE END OF FEBRUARY when the first tremor was felt; the Shanghai Composite Index fell a massive 8.84%. In spite of this warning it would be months before the nascent economic crisis came to the attention of the world’s political leaders. As the winter of 2007 passed markets recovered their brash self-assurance. Life continued with the same unabashed optimism people had become accustomed to in the glow of George Bush’s New World Order and Tony Blair’s Cool Britannia.
