Held in the mountainous West Javan capital, Bandung, in Indonesia, the Asian-African conference was sponsored by the prime ministers of Burma, Ceylon (Sri Lanka), India, Indonesia and Pakistan, all of which had gained their independence during the previous decade. Representatives of twenty-nine countries, representing half the world's population, travelled to Bandung to build political and economic cooperation. The conference's final communiqué condemned the racial discrimination and 'denial of the fundamental rights of man' in the existing colonies, and declared colonialism in all its manifestations 'an evil which should speedily be brought to an end'. At the same time, it stressed the urgency of economic development, including through foreign capital investment.

Jessica Whyte, The Morals of the Market, loc. 275