Since the end of the cold war, discussions at the World Economic Forum in Davos have followed a reliable pattern. Everybody agreed that globalisation was a jolly good thing – but it was the delegates from the US and Europe who shaped the debate. It was informally accepted that the flow of ideas – as well as investment and jobs – was from west to east.

The global financial crisis has changed all that. At this year’s Davos, the western delegates seemed depressed, defensive or even mildly deranged in the case of Nicolas Sarkozy, the French president. After listening to Mr Sarkozy’s passionate attack on financial capitalism,...