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“Underdevelopment”

Table of Contents

Intro

1 History

1.1 Colonial Legacies

1.2 Green Revolution

2 Relevant Theoretical Frameworks

2.1 Modernization theory

2.2 Dependency theory

3 Examples of underdeveloped countries and regions

3.1 Africa

3.2 Latin America

3.3 South and Central Asia

1. Afghanistan*

3.4 The Arab World (MENA)

Intro:

Underdevelopment  as it pertains to nations is used to categorize countries that are modernizing but have lagged behind relative to what is known as the developed or first world. Not to be confused with “undeveloped”, which is used to describe regions or resources that aren’t being used at all,  “underdevelopment” is a relational term.

The concept of development itself, which emerged during the colonial era, came to be seen as a universal necessity so those countries who progressed slowly or, in many cases even regressed, were seen as less than or inadequate. . Mexican activist, Gustavo Esteva, asserted that underdevelopment began when American president Harry Truman delivered his inaugural address in 1949 since, after the second world war, poverty on a mass scale was suddenly  “discovered” in these underdeveloped regions of the world (escobar). Esteva stated that, “On that day two billion people became underdeveloped.” More than half of the world’s nations were categorized by what they lacked. The other things that could have categorized their dynamic and varying cultures faded while their impoverishment and  “underdeveloped” state moved to the forefront of the characterization of these countries (most of which were newly independent). The aura of inevitability that was associated with development devalued non-European cultures and discredited the skills and values that the global north learned from them.

When the world began to categorize nations based on their economic status, it the narrowed the issue of underdevelopment to economics. As a result, the solutions brought forth by the experts of the discourse would also lie in economics and economic growth.

(my segway to the contribution made by a previous editor)

“In economics, underdevelopment is when resources are not used to their full socio-economic potential, with the result that local or regional development is slower in most cases than it should be, specially compare with the investment and innovation in countries that surround it. Furthermore, it results from the complex interplay of internal and external factors that allow less developed countries only a lop-sided development progression. Underdeveloped nations are characterized by a wide disparity between their rich and poor populations, and an unhealthy balance of trade.[1] Symptoms of underdevelopment include lack of access to job opportunities, health care, drinkable water, food, education and housing.[2]” (part of intro retained from the original).  As a result populations in underdeveloped regions have lower life expectancy and literacy rates, but suffer from higher rates of malnutrition.

History (What contributed to this underdevelopment that is so visible today):

• Colonial legacies

Colonialism, which dates back to the 15th century,  involved the subjugation of numerous countries and cultures by physical and psychological force through military conquest. Colonialism, the manifestation of the White Man’s Burden, was founded on racism and inequality and it altered non-european cultures irreversibly. The European concept of “private property” led to the undermining of local crafts and farming systems. The colonizers introduced and imposed new forms of inequalities and systems of oppression to facilitate the process of exploitation in their colonies. During this era the african people were divided around new tensions which still disrupt their societies today. In addition to the internal divisions, there were also diasporas of the African, Indian, and Chinese peoples (McMichael) These legacies have impacted modern expressions of race, ethnicity, and nationality.

• Industrial and green revolutions  (Jennifer Clapp)

During the Green Revolution, which began in the 1950s, developed countries such as the U.S, in an attempt to modernize the global agricultural sector, sought to export the industrial agricultural model of production.  At the start of the Green Revolution wealthy countries such as the U.S., Canada, and other advanced european countries were giving their surplus crops to poorer countries in the form of food aid in order to mitigate the widespread hunger the world was now witnessing in the newly independent countries that to figure how to move forward with development while coping with their divided societies.

During the start of the Green Revolution, crops that weren’t previously prevalent across the the globe, such as wheat, were being transferred and from the global north to south in massive quantities. This occurred until developing countries, such as India,  became  heavily dependant on the food aid- much of which were crops that could not be grown locally. In order to now help dependent countries to develop a self-sufficient food sector, instead of just relying on the food aid, the U.S. made it conditional for recipients of food-aid to adopt the whole industrial model of agriculture.

The revolution was titled “Green” not just because of its connections to agriculture but also was used as a tool to fight the “Red”, or communist revolution.  The West  believed that hunger had the power to drive people to communism, so food aid was used explicitly to fight the spread communism. It was meant  to increase food security in poor nations by helping them move to being self sufficient, but the complete industrial model of agriculture had a complex system of inputs that wasn’t explicitly advertised. It wasn’t the quick miracle that many farmers in the global south hoped it would be . In order for yields to actually increase farmers needed fertilizers, pesticides, and a new irrigation system. A costly process that cut profits for the farmers even though their yields rose .

The countries that were dependent on food aid just changed to being dependent on the transnational corporations that provided these agricultural inputs that the system required. Conversely, new transnational corporations rose during the revolution and profited off of the same farmers that were struggling to maintain their yields in this new system that resembled a never ending treadmill.

The Green Revolution was able to increase crop yields, at least in the short term before land was degraded by the newly introduced toxic agricultural tools, but in the process it disturbed the social, economic, and cultural systems of many of the countries that are now considered underdeveloped.

• Gene revolution (current)

Relevant Theories:

-Modernization Theory

One of the first major theories to surface as a solution to this new issue of “underdevelopment” was the Modernization Theory . Post World War Two, and with the “discovery” of mass poverty and hunger, the world leaders that had emerged from the war saw the former colonies as areas that needed increasing amounts of intervention because their populations were the subjects of much suffering. It became a moral imperative for developed nations, primarily the U.S., to offer assistance so that these countries could industrialized the way the countries of the first world had.  In alignment with this furthering of the White Man’s Burden, out of the United States, emerged the Modernization theory which equated modernization with industrialization, development and progress.

One of the most notable contributors to the theory was Walt Whitman Rostow who developed an economic model which outlined five stages of growth for nations in his work titled, “The Stages of Economic Growth: A Non-Communist Manifesto”.

Rostow’s Five Stages are as follows:

1. The Traditional Society
2. The Preconditions for take-off
3. The Take-off
4. The Drive to Maturity
5. The Age of High Mass Consumption

These stages present a linear trajectory of development in a which the traditional society, exhibiting feudal and “backward” characteristics, can transform into a modern society with advanced industries and urban societies.

Rostow’s model, which places national growth on a linear path to modernization and hails industrialization as the key to development, explains the gap between wealthy and impoverished nations by claiming that, since various nations began the process of development at different time periods, they’re simply at different stages of growth. Rostow’s model makes the assumption that  the inequality between states will eventually disappear once each reaches the final stage of growth. This in turn justifies the present inequality as a natural progression of  development.

The theory of modernization was most influential in the 1950s and 60s, but began to decline as scholars from various backgrounds such as  Andre Gunder Frank and  Immanuel Wallerstein with their Dependency and World System theories, came forth with critiques that made it too controversial to remain the leading thought within the discourse.

-Dependency theory

Dependency theory, another prominent theory that emerged  in the development discourse, explicitly rejects the idea that development is a linear process in which undeveloped and therefore “backward” societies progressively transform into modernized and industrialized societies. Dependency theory argues that the process of the development and the international relations within which it operates,  is a lot more dynamic than modernization theory assumes. In addition, historical context needs to be accounted for to really understand the underdevelopment that is present to this day.

Unlike Rostow’s model, which supports that current underdevelopment is the existence of countries at different stages of growth and envisages that every country will eventually reach modernization with increased contact from advanced countries, dependency theory supports that

A prominent expert* Andre Gunder Frank (radical) argues that the very “contact” that modernization advocates for is what has caused promoted the existence of underdevelopment due it’s extractive and exploitative structures.

In accordance with this theory, in his paper “  “ discussed how the project of development tends to overlook value of the cultural systems that were in place before colonialism and the damage that occurred during the colonial era.

World Systems theory

World system theory adds another layer to what dependency theorists describe as the structure of the world: the semi-periphery. The semi-periphery is composed of countries such as ( Brazil and South Africa ) that can’t simply be categorized as part of the core or the periphery (i.e. they have developed urban areas but also large areas of rural poverty). World systems  theory also states that the dynamic of surplus extraction that occurs between nations also occurs within them, between their elite and poor classes.

Underdeveloped Regions around the world

Africa

Although over ten percent of the world’s population (and increasing rapidly) is located in  Sub-Saharan Africa, the region is only responsible for about three percent of global GDP (Gross Domestic Product).(“extractive”) Africa is a continent that is considered severely and nearly consistently underdeveloped. The problems that plague the region range from corrupt governments, resource exploitation, and widespread malnourishment.  One of things that has been used to explain  Africa’s depravement and economic regression, as it is the only region that has a seen poverty growth in the last quarter of a century, is the fact that the continent in rich in natural resources. The paradoxical resource course has led the continent to be divided and exploited for its oil, diamonds, and other valuable minerals and metals that fall into the hands of an unaccountable few while millions of its own people live far below the poverty line.  In fact, thirty-two of the world’s thirty-eight highly indebted and impoverished countries can be found in Africa (Extractive) Many of the problems can be found in multiple countries, but as each country had a unique colonial experience, the problems they face today are also unique from each other and the rest of the world.

Central and South Asia

-Afghanistan (interesting choice included by previous editor)

Latin America