The Decline of Corporatist Bargaining The sustained, high economic growth in Western Europe during the post-war period until 1973 led to dramatic changes in the region's political economy. As advances in transportation and communication extended the reach of international trade into new areas of the world, as technological advances allowed establishment of manufacturing facilities overseas, and as European real wages climbed to unprecedented heights, the industrial base that had served as the foundation for rapid Western European growth in th ....