Theories explaining why superpowers exist Flashcards
Modernisation Theory
Was used to explain the dominance of British Empire and USA, the first nations to go through an industrial revolution. This gave them an initial advantage over the unindustrialised. The economies of developed countries moved through five stage and all countries would follow the same development pathways. Rostow was a strong believer in free trade and capitalism. He believed that Communist countries such as China and Cuba could not expect to develop unless they adopted this model. His model led to many developing countries attempting to create the preconditions for take-off by investing in key infrastructure.
Dependancy Theory
Frank views the world as having an underdeveloped periphery and an economically developed core. The capitalist core deliberately keeps the periphery in a state of underdevelopment by exploiting its cheap resources and taking most of its skilled workers. It argues that the developing world is placed in a position of selling its resources to the developed world for very little. The core drains the periphery if any chance of developing by talking its workers.
China Population
1.3 billion
World Systems theory
Attempts to overcome the problem of a two tier world. Wallerstein’s view is a three tier world, this is more dynamic and allows for change to take place, with some countries entering the semi-periphery and even entering the core. Dependency theory is much more static. Sees development of the capitalist world economy as detrimental to a large proportion of the world’s population.
India population
1.2 billion
China key date
1949, Communist revolution
India key date
1947, Independence from Britain.
China’s path to development
State led industrialisation, increasing liberalisation and economic reform in the 80s.
India’s path to development
Economic and political independence and home grown technology. High import tariffs, still mainly rural.
Wallerstein view on why China and India have emerged
There are two conflicting views as to why China and India have developed. Wallerstein takes the view that industrial capitalism was born in Europe and China and India represent another stage of development through the spread of global economy.
How do NICs challenge dependency theory?
The rise of NICs such as the Asian Tigers seems to argue against Dependency theory because they have developed recently. They managed to developed from aid from USA, it was seen as a way to combat communism. Debt from aid keeps the developing world ‘underdeveloped’. “Development of underdevelopment”.
