The word or underdevelopment disturbs
everyone who lives in the developing areas of the world. It may mean different things
to different people but most people are sure on fact that under-development
refers a colonised economy or inadequate industrial development or it now may draw
closer to mean that foreign is somehow good. Underdevelopment is the state of
an organization for instances a country that has not attained its maturity
overtime. Meanwhile, It is often used to refer to economic underdevelopment and
the symptoms of which include growth of
slums, lack of access to job opportunities, poverty, health care, poor infrastructure,
paucity of drinkable water, absence of elementary education, food shortage, diseases,
housing and displacement issues on the question of development.
The world consists of a group of rich
nations and a large number of poor nations. It is usually held that economic
development takes place in a series of capitalist stages and that today's
underdeveloped countries are still in a stage of history through which the now
developed countries passed long ago.The separation of the world into rich and poor
nations and the splitting up within poor nations between a minority of rich
people and a majority of poor people living at a minimum subsistence level has
been apparent to careful observers for a long time in the area of development
research. The apparently stumpy standard of living of the mass of the
population in developing countries is labeled out as the key issue in
development in developing areas of the world.
Ever since the close of World War II,
all over the world we have been experiencing a worldwide effort for the
improvement of living conditions in the so-called developing countries and to
rebuild the devastated economies. In the commencement, there was little enquiry
as to the causes of underdevelopment of newly born countries; eventually the
newly independent countries as well as international bodies like United Nations
and industrialized countries tried to promote development by applying measures
like the research collaboration in developing areas, the expansion of education
and building up schooling system, the development of infrastructure for
material growth and most of them followed the example of western model of
development. Meanwhile, it became noticeable that this was more or less a
treatment of symptoms instead of addressing causes and by the pass of time the
gap between rich and poor nations gradually widened and the under-development
debate has begun to surface in the meetings of the developed and less developed
countries of this world.
There are many features of under-development. Population growth
is believed to be the first criterion of underdevelopment but really one cannot
correctly assess whether a high or low ratio of population to land area is an
indicator of underdevelopment and it’s very much controversial. For instances, there are many underdeveloped countries in Africa, Asia and Latin
America where the ratio of population to land is very low. At the same time, countries
like India, Indonesia Pakistan having high ratio of population to land also
exhibit signs of underdevelopment overtime.
In addition, ratio of industrial output to total output is low in developing
countries. The degree of industrialisation is taken as the criterion for
under-development. In countries where agriculture is well developed, the
disposable agricultural surplus income will be generally used to subsidize
uneconomic urban industries by some means.
Ragnar Nurkse affirmed that underdeveloped countries are those which compared
with the advanced countries are under-equipped with capital in relation to their
population and natural resources[i]
and poor rate of capital to per head is an indicator. The most frequently established criterion of underdevelopment is
the low per capita income of underdeveloped countries as compared with the
advanced countries in many measures.
Harvey Leibenstein has classified the
characteristics of underdevelopment under four major heads, namely Economic, Demographic,
Cultural and Political and Technological and Miscellaneous. In short the commonly
considered features of underdevelopment
are:1.Preponderence of Agriculture,2.Population pressure and Unemployment,3.Poor
income and Poor savings,4.Under-utilisation of resources,5.Capital deficiency,6.Low
level of technology,7.Foreign trade orientation,8.Poor Economic Organization 9.Lack
of suitable Socio-Economic Setup, and 10.A Dualistic Economy.
At the same time there were many
theoretical propositions as to explain why underdevelopment in developing
countries. The fundamental question is to encounter why under-development in developing
countries? Is the developing countries themselves are responsible for their
under-development? This question has been beautifully addressed by a plenty
shclolars with empirical evidence to suggest that under-development has many
reasons and most notable it is observed from most propositions is that
developing countries are not responsible for their under-development. There are a great number of explanations for
underdevelopment and concepts of development in Modrnisation theory, dependency
theory, and Marxist theory to explain the problem.
Modernization theory
According to modernisation theories, the
internal factors in the countries, for instances traditional agrarian
structure, illiteracy, the low division of labour, the traditional attitude of
the population, the lack of communication and infrastructure, prevailing
traditionalism etc., are guilty for underdevelopment in developing areas.
Differences in structure and historical origin are considered of little
importance under this theory; international dependencies are not taken into
account at the same time.
As a result, a change of these
endogenous factors is the strategy for development to effect changes. The
industrialized countries are to be considered the model for economy and society
and this replica will be reached sooner or later by developing areas. There is
a continuum between the least and the most developed country and each country
has its position on this line by history. The difference as compared to the
industrialized countries is the degree of backwardness which has to be made up
for by now. Suitable measures are the modernization of the capital aid,
production apparatus, transfer of know-how, financial aid so that the
developing countries can reach the stage of industrialized countries as soon as
possible and become similar to them. Development is seen as an increase of
production and efficiency and measured primarily by comparing the per capita
income and this model is purely economical. However this model is vehemently
criticized for it fails to explain the fundamental reasons for
under-development in developing areas.
Marxist
Theories of Under-development
The Classical Marxism was obviously
shaped by Marx (1818 – 1883) and Marx thought that when the rich and advanced
country trades its goods above their value even though it is cheaper than the
competing countries it can be said to be capitalist imperialism at the outset.
For Marx capitalist imperialism was that it would generate proliferation of
autonomous capitalism. Marx saw distant areas of the world as undeveloped until
they were developed by capitalism and this is a point on which Marx would agree
with neo-evolutionary and modernisation theorists at the best. On the whole
Marx and Engels didn’t write much about development but more about capitalism
and lots about dominant and subordinate classes. The interest of Marx was about
how capitalism developed in the first world and other countries were only used
in comparative studies although the roots of Marxist development theories lie
in classical Marxism for the most part.
In fact, Rosa Luxemburg was the leading
Marxist to lay emphasis on the developing countries in The Accumulation of
Capital (1913) and opined that under-development is the result of accumulation
of capital. To Luxemburg the productive capacity of West outperform the
consumer’s ability to buy and so the pre-capitalist developing countries provided
raw materials and new markets for capital as such in under-developing economies.
To sum up therefore, Luxemburg envisages a world capitalist system using the developing
areas for that matter and exploitation through accumulation.
Also Lenin detailed imperialism, and informed
by Luxemburg, Bukharin and as a whole has furthered the under-development notions
and he defined imperialism as the “monopoly stage of capitalism”. The key idea
of Lenin’s conceptualization was finance capital that is capital controlled by
banks and employed by industrialists. Therefore the centralization of local,
national and world economics altogether contributed to imperialist expansion
and under-development.
The neo-Marxists came after classical
Marxists and views something different. The variation and difference between
classical Marxism and neo-Marxism is that neo-Marxists see imperialism as
responsible for underdevelopment as such. For the most part all
underdevelopment theories are Leninist for them. There are three branches of
neo-Marxism- dependency, underdevelopment, and world-system theory based on a
Marxist perspectives.
Dependency theory
Another very useful theory is dependence
theories, to them the cause of underdevelopment is the dependence of developing
countries on industrialized countries while internal factors of developing
countries are measured extraneous or seen as symptoms and consequences of
dependence at large. In fact the development of industrialized countries and
the underdevelopment of developing countries are parts of one historical
process that is an out come of a peculiar historical process. Developing
countries are dependent countries in fact they were made so. The economic and
political interests of industrialized countries determine their development or
underdevelopment in different parts of the world. The goals are superimposed
and covered up. Underdevelopment is not backwardness but intentional downward
development and it is obviously an unintentional consequences.
As to the causes of dependence leading
to under-development nay differ from theory to theory, economic factors always
dominating in most discussions. External trade theories concentrate on economic
relations between countries of rich and poor. Imperialism theories stress the politico
economic interest of developed nation lead to under-development of developing areas
during colonization while dependencia theories concentrate on the deformation
of internal structures by dependence which perpetuates the situation more
badly.
Dependence theories concentrate on
explanations of the origin of underdevelopment and pay little attention to
strategies for overcoming this situation overtime in their explanation. Inherent
development here means liberation, end of structural dependence, and independence
and obviously more emancipation from material and spiritual limitations.
Imperialism
Theory
The imperialism theory explains the
domination of underdeveloped areas by industrialized and western nationalities as
the outcome of dissimilar economic and technological levels and unequal power
potential ensuing from a different economic growth as of now. The upshot and
outcome of the development of industrial capitalistic societies is a strain for
expansion which may lead to military or political acquisition that is colonies
or to maintaining economic dependence of developing and poor countries. More
over different theories have their own explanation of the reason for the anxiety
for expansion but it is always seen as the result of the inability to cope
internally with the consequences of permanent technological innovation and
their effects on the society at the best.
Reasons
for the underdevelopment in the developing countries?
To understand what is accountable for under-development of developing countries, Frantz Fanon concludes the article Concerning Violence with an associate phrase to the poor nations that they ought to not forget the very fact that the colonizers are accountable and ethically responsible to pay off them for factually plundering them throughout the years of establishment in nineteenth and twentieth centuries.
To understand what is accountable for under-development of developing countries, Frantz Fanon concludes the article Concerning Violence with an associate phrase to the poor nations that they ought to not forget the very fact that the colonizers are accountable and ethically responsible to pay off them for factually plundering them throughout the years of establishment in nineteenth and twentieth centuries.
Nevertheless once we look as if at the
full method of establishment during a western-favored perspective, the image is
totally different and varying. If we glance into the explanations of at the
outset; we are going to notice that the Europeans in search of markets due to
large production throughout the commercial revolution, Europe occupied
developing countries of the world to sell their product. Thus it's obvious that
technological revolution and technological advancement befell Europe for colonization
of under-developed areas.
What was happening within the
countries in developing areas throughout same period? simply examine the
similarities of the developing countries; it's clear that these nations measure
that in the time of establishment of colonialism they didn’t have a well
structured education system which they'd adhered to the standard social and non
secular practices in line and affinity with the truthfulness of the varied social, non
secular and cultural beliefs altogether.
In addition; on the opposite these
countries had a less individualistic culture than the colonizer’s countries
had. It’s not higher to seem from a perspective and for them these countries so
were non-civilized. The actual fact that technological development had its
roots in Europe tells that they did one thing special that these countries
didn’t do. Once Europeans came to loot these countries they didn’t have the
arms or ammunitions to defend them. These nations during the time were lazy,
shortsighted, unintelligible to European perspective and scholars; as a result
of they couldn’t defend themselves and during this time. Obviously these are
all wrong and ethnocentric European misconceptions.
If the globe hasn’t been settled, the
nations states that exists nowadays, the quick rate of economic process and
also the technological and industrial bloom that the world expertise today
wouldn't are doable. Well the intentions of the colonizers and also the acts of
the colonizers may not be virtuously excusable nor will we tend to deny the
very fact that the imperialist countries don't seem to be still despoil of the
underdeveloped nations.
However, one issue that ought to be
unbroken in mind is that the indisputable fact that although developed
countries might need a large comparative advantage through the method of
establishment, absolutely the advantage of being settled can not be simply
unnoted.
The causes of underdevelopment in
developing countries include many factors, Imperialism and colonialism from
superior nations whom directly or indirectly may be within the helms of affairs
of those developing countries. The miserliness
in developing countries that collect taxes from the folks take care of their
own interest at the expense of the average man. Careless attitudes of the
population of the developing countries that to figure and solve their issues
rather hoping on governments exclusively for facilities. Traditionalism and belief
of the developing countries in resolution are enhancing issues. People feel
adamant to alter and believe that no matter happens to them is results of
destiny or the need of some spiritual being.
In short it is contented that
developing countries are not responsible for their underdevelopment. There are
many components that invariably affect underdevelopment. All the theories of under-development, for
instances Marxist, dependency, Imperialist and Modernization theories are well
explaining this.
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