POL 2103 Lecture Notes - Lecture 7: Free Trade, Comparative Advantage, False Consciousness

• School: University of Ottawa
• Department: Political Science
• Course: POL 2103
• Professor: Ivaylo Grouev

Document Summary

Theory of the dependence (latin america) A (cid:862)(cid:373)i(cid:272)ro(cid:863) approa(cid:272)h (cid:449)hi(cid:272)h (cid:271)egi(cid:374)s i(cid:374) the (cid:1010)(cid:1004) -(cid:1011)(cid:1004)"s a(cid:374)d has a disti(cid:374)(cid:272)t sociological focus. Most authors focused their attention on latin america. Pessimistic vision vis- -(cid:448)is the de(cid:448)elop(cid:373)e(cid:374)t of the (cid:862)third world (cid:272)ou(cid:374)tries(cid:863): Dependency theory posits that the cause of the low levels of development in less economically developed countries (ledc"s) is caused by their reliance and dependence on more economically developed countries (medc"s) - i. e. the. Ledc"s are undeveloped because they rely on the medc"s. Dependency theory asserts that ledc"s will remain less developed because the surplus that they produce will be siphoned off by medc"s - under the guise of multinational corporations. There is, as such, no profit left for reinvestment and development. The core of the dependency relation between center and periphery lays the inability of the periphery to develop an autonomous and dynamic process of technological innovation.