Hostname: page-component-cd9895bd7-gxg78 Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-12-27T12:07:52.907Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false

Third World vulnerabilities and global negotiations

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  26 October 2009

Extract

What do Third World countries want? More wealth. How can they get it? By adopting more economically rational policies. What should the North do? Facilitate these policies. How should the North approach global negotiations? With cautious optimism. What is the long term prognosis for North–South relations? Hopeful, at least if economic development occurs. This is the common wisdom about relations between industrialized and developing areas in the United States and much of the rest of the North, Within this fold there are intense debates among adherents of conventional liberal, reformist liberal, and interdependence viewpoints. But the emphasis on economics at the expense of politics, on material well-being as opposed to power and control, pervades all of these orientations.

Type
Research Article
Copyright
Copyright © British International Studies Association 1983

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

1. Bauer, P. T. and Yamey, B. S., ‘Against the New International Economic Order’, Commentary, 63 (April 1977), p. 29.Google Scholar See also Bauer, P. T., Equality, The Third World and Economic Delusion (London, 1981)Google Scholar; and Johnson, Harry, ‘Commodities: Less Developed Countries' Demands and Developed Countries' Responses’Google Scholar, in Bhagwati, Jagdish N., The New International Economic Order: The North-South Debate (Cambridge, Mass., 1977).Google Scholar

2. For representative statements of this position see Krueger, Anne O., Foreign Trade Regimes and Economic Development: Liberalization Attempts and Consequences (Cambridge, Mass., 1978)Google Scholar, which summarizes a larger series on foreign trade regimes sponsored by the National Bureau of Economic Research and edited by Kreuger, and Bhagwati., Jagdish N.Helleiner, G. K., ‘World Market Imperfections and Developing Countries’, in Cline, William R. (ed.), Policy Alternatives for a New International Economic Order (New York, 1978)Google Scholar is particularly critical of market imperfections. See also Fishlow, Albert, ‘A New International Economic Order: What Kind?’Google Scholar, in Fishlow, Albert, et ah, Rich and Poor Nations in the World Economy (New York, 1978).Google Scholar

3. Independent Commission on International Development Issues (Brandt Commission), North-South, A Program for Survival (Cambridge, Mass., 1981), p. 13.Google Scholar For other examples of interdependence reasoning see Ward, Barbara, ‘Another Chance for the North’, Foreign Affairs, 59 (Winter 1980/1981)CrossRefGoogle Scholar; John W.Sewell, ‘Can the North Prosper Without Growth and Progress in the South?’, in McLaughlin, Martin M., The United States and World Development, 1979 (New York, 1979)Google Scholar; and Erlich, Thomas and Gwin, Catherine, ‘A Third World Strategy’, Foreign Policy, 44 (Fall 1981).Google Scholar

4. Brandt Commission, Report, p. 33.

5. US Department of State, Bureau of Public Affairs, Current Policy, No. 329, 19 October 1981.

6. US Department of the Treasury, Treasury News, R-560, 7 January 1982.

7. Quoted in the Los Angeles Times, 31 May 1977, 5:1.Google Scholar

8. All figures derived from World Bank, World Development Report, 1981 (Washington, DC, 1981), Tables 1, 2,17, and 21.Google Scholar

9. Figures from International Monetary Fund, World Economic Outlook (Washington, DC, June 1981)Google Scholar, Appendix B, Statistical Tables 13 and 30.

10. The basic argument developed here and throughout this essay draws heavily on the analysis presented in Tucker, Robert W., The Inequality of Nations (New York, 1977).Google Scholar

11. Richter, Rosemary, ‘Battle of the Bias’, Foreign Policy, 34 (Spring 1979)Google Scholar; for a general discussion of the information problem see O'Brien, Rita Cruise and Helleiner, G. K., ‘The Political Economy of Information in a Changing International Economic Order’, International Organization, 34 (Autumn 1980).CrossRefGoogle Scholar

12. Juda, Lawrence, ‘World Shipping, UNCTAD, and the New International Economic Order’. International Organization, 35 (Summer 1981).CrossRefGoogle Scholar

13. Jonsson, Christer, ‘Sphere of Flying: The Politics of International Aviation’, International Organization, 35 (Spring 1981).CrossRefGoogle Scholar

14. Krasner, Stephen D., ‘Power Structures and Regional Development Banks’, International Organization, 35 (Spring 1981).CrossRefGoogle Scholar

15. GATT, International Trade, 1980/81 (Geneva, 1981), Appendix tables.Google Scholar

16. United Nations, Economic and Social Council, Commission on Transnational Corporations, Issues Arising from Decisions Taken by the General Assembly and the Economic and Social Council: Progress made Towards the Establishment of the New International Economic Order: The Role of Transnational Corporations, E/C. 10/74 (16 May 1980), pp. 1718.Google Scholar

17. US Department of the Treasury, Treasury News, R-560, 7 January 1982.Google Scholar

18. For two recent discussions, both critical of the American position, see Watt, D. C., ‘Ocean Resources: The Need for Agreement’, International Affairs, 58 (Winter 19811982)Google Scholar; and Ratiner, Leigh S., ‘The Law of the Sea: Cross-roads for US Policy’, Foreign Affairs, 60 (Summer 1982).CrossRefGoogle Scholar

19. Alexander, Tom, ‘The Reaganites' Misadventures at Sea’, Fortune, 106 (23 August 1982).Google Scholar

20. Japan did sign the Convention in early 1983.