Geography Reference
In-Depth Information
made economic gains. Like modernization theory, depen-
dency theory is based on generalizations about economic
change that pay relatively little attention to geographi-
cal differences in culture, politics, and society. Although
both models provide some insights into the development
process, neither is greatly concerned with the spatial and
cultural situation of particular places—central elements of
geographical analysis.
Geography and Context
As geographers, economists, and other social scientists
came to realize that studying economic development
divorced from political and social context did not refl ect
reality, geographers began to search for a development the-
ory that encompassed geography, scale, place, and culture.
Immanuel Wallerstein's
world-systems theory
provided
a useful framework for many. We discussed world-systems
theory in Chapter 8, focusing on how the theory provides
insights into the political organization of space. In this chap-
ter, we focus on how world-systems theory helps us under-
stand the geography of development.
Many geographers are drawn to world-systems
theory because it is sensitive to the relationships among
development processes that occur in different places.
Specifi cally, Wallerstein's division of the world into a
three-
tier structure
—the core, periphery, and semiperiphery—
helps explain the interconnections between places in the
global economy. As discussed in more detail in Chapter
8, core processes generate wealth in a place because they
require higher levels of education, more sophisticated
technologies, and higher wages and benefi ts. When core
processes are embedded in a place (such as the Telecom
corridor in Richardson-Plano, Texas), wealth is gener-
ated for the people in that place. Peripheral processes,
on the other hand, require little education, lower tech-
nologies, and lower wages and benefi ts. Core regions are
those that have achieved high levels of socioeconomic
prosperity and are dominant players in the global eco-
nomic game. When peripheral processes are embed-
ded in a place (such as banana growers in Ecuador), the
processes often generate little wealth for the people in
that place. Periphery regions are poor regions that are
dependent in signifi cant ways on the core and do not
have as much control over their own affairs, economi-
cally or politically. The semiperiphery exhibits both
core and peripheral processes, and semiperipheral places
serve as a buffer between the core and periphery in the
world-economy. Countries of the semiperiphery exert
more power than peripheral regions but remain heavily
infl uenced by core regions.
Dividing the world into cores, semiperipheries, and
peripheries might seem to do little more than replace
developed, developing, and underdeveloped with a new
Figure 10.6
San Salvador, El Salvador.
A woman and young boy use dol-
lars to pay for groceries in El Salvador, a country that underwent
dollarization in 2001.
© AFP/News Com.
economies of the two countries were tied long before
dollarization occurred. Over 2 million Salvadorians live
in the United States, and in 2010, they sent $3.5 billion
in remittances to El Salvador. With this fl ow of American
dollars to El Salvador, many transactions occurred
in dollars long before the offi cial switch. The United
Nations Development Program estimates that 22.3 per-
cent of families in El Salvador receive remittances. In
addition, over two-thirds of El Salvador's exports go to
the United States. When the Federal Reserve Board in
the United States controls the supply of dollars by alter-
ing the interest rates, the ramifi cations are felt directly in
El Salvador.
Dependency theory contends that economic pros-
perity is extremely diffi cult to achieve in regions and coun-
tries that have traditionally been dominated by external
powers. Yet some traditionally “dependent” regions have
