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In the wake of Barack Obama's re-election and the leadership change in China, many economists, businesspeople and leaders have assumed that, with internationalists at the helm of the world's two largest economies, the world will see a new period of greater economic integration.

Optimists hope that this integration eventually will pull the globe out of its prolonged economic malaise. Indeed, many struggling economies, such as Greece, already are seeking closer economic integration with China; Chinese aid and investment has helped revitalise Greece's most important ports.

And as developing nations such as China take the lead on trade deals, they also are gaining a bigger role in international financial organisations, which thus supposedly also are becoming...