The writer, Morgan Stanley Investment Management’s chief global strategist, is author of ‘The Ten Rules of Successful Nations’

After their worst decade since the 1930s, emerging stock markets continued to underperform as a group in 2021, deepening the isolation that surrounds this sprawling asset class. So it will come as a surprise to many that eight of the top 10, and 13 of the top 20, best-performing markets of 2021 were in the developing world.

How can that add up? Given its size, China dragged down the emerging market index. With Beijing cracking down on its big technology companies, and self-isolating in the name of economic self-reliance, the country’s stocks were hammered. China was the world’s second worst-performing market last year, ranking 58th out of 59, just ahead of Pakistan.