For the past four years the major industrial OECD countries have been in the throes of a crisis brought to a head by the oil price rises of 1973-74, but arising from longer-run difficulties which had already begun to appear by the late 1960s. The crisis is by no means over. The situation of the economically stronger countries such as the USA, Japan and West Germany seems to be on the upturn but the recovery of others including Britain is still very much in doubt.