Global Development Issues (AQA A-Level Sociology): Revision Notes
Aspects of Development
Development can be measured and understood through several key dimensions. Each aspect reveals different challenges and opportunities facing countries as they work towards improving living standards for their populations.
Demography
Demography refers to the study of population changes over time. Population patterns vary dramatically between developed and developing regions, creating different challenges for development planning.
Population growth patterns
Population growth occurs much more rapidly in developing countries compared to industrialised nations. While developed countries experience slow, stable population growth, many Less Economically Developed Countries (LEDCs) face rapid population expansion that can strain resources and infrastructure.
The global population has grown exponentially since 1750, with projections suggesting continued growth until 2050. Most of this growth concentrates in developing regions, while developed countries actually experience ageing populations as birth rates decline and life expectancy increases.
Interestingly, there exists roughly equal numbers of males and females globally. However, some countries like China show significant gender imbalances, with more males than females. This stems partly from the one-child policy and cultural preferences for male children, sometimes leading to selective practices that favour boys.
Malthusian and modernisation theories
Thomas Malthus (1798) argued that population growth creates serious problems for societies. He believed populations could grow faster than their ability to produce food, leading to resource scarcity, famine, and ultimately death that would balance the population-resource equation.
Neo-Malthusian theorist Ehrlich (1968) updated this perspective, arguing that rapid population growth puts excessive pressure on global resources. He particularly focused on developing countries experiencing problems like famine and malnutrition, suggesting that over-population damages both development prospects and environmental sustainability.
Modernisation theorists build on these ideas, viewing over-population as one of the biggest obstacles to development. They argue that economic progress requires spending resources on feeding growing populations rather than building infrastructure to support long-term growth. Their proposed solutions include promoting birth control methods and encouraging Western governments and international organisations to fund family planning programmes.
Some modernisation theorists suggest that education for women helps reduce birth rates, as educated women tend to have fewer children. More controversially, some have proposed that men in developing countries with many children should undergo sterilisation procedures.
Criticisms of population-focused theories
Cornell (2000) challenged Ehrlich's predictions, showing that population growth was occurring more slowly than Ehrlich had forecast. Harrison (1990) provided a different perspective entirely, arguing that birth rates are not the primary cause of population growth. Instead, population growth results from declining death rates, particularly reduced infant mortality rates. People have similar numbers of babies, but more children survive to adulthood.
Harrison agreed that population growth threatens environmental sustainability but challenged the focus on birth control as the main solution.
Challenges in reducing birth rates
Various attempts to reduce birth rates in developing countries have achieved limited success. Religious factors play a role, as Islam and Roman Catholicism discourage or prohibit contraception use. Harrison noted that the fastest rates of population growth occur in Muslim countries where traditional ideas about women and family roles predominate.
Feminists argue that meaningful progress on population control requires fundamental changes in society. Countries must become less patriarchal and improve women's social positions so they can make autonomous decisions about reproduction. Simply making contraception available proves insufficient - societies need broader changes in how women are treated and valued.
Alternative perspectives on population growth
Marxists reject the idea that population growth creates development problems. They blame the global capitalist system rather than population numbers. Modernisation theorists assume Malthus was correct about food scarcity, but Marxists argue that growing populations can produce adequate food supplies. The real issue involves unfair distribution of global resources - capitalism directs food towards profitable markets rather than where it's needed most.
Dependency theorists support resource redistribution approaches. They argue that Western countries continue taking the best resources from developing nations, leaving inhabitants with poor quality land. Land reform and redistribution would better address poverty than population control measures.
Adamson (1986) suggests focusing on population growth distracts from the real causes of poverty - unfair distribution of resources. He argues developed countries contribute more to environmental problems through over-consumption, environmental damage, and economic exploitation of developing nations.
Some theorists view population growth positively, seeing it as encouraging development. Population pressure on resources encourages innovation and more productive approaches. Historical examples like 19th century Britain show population growth contributing to industrialisation.
Education
Good education has been proven to improve living standards and create more productive, engaged populations. Developing countries have increased educational spending significantly in recent decades.
Education's role in improving living standards
In Rostow's model of development, an educated workforce becomes necessary for industrial development. Many sociologists, particularly functionalists and modernisation theorists, consider education essential for development progress.
Economic development requires expert, technical knowledge at local levels. While expertise can be imported from other countries, international organisations and More Economically Developed Countries (MEDCs) prefer seeing LEDCs train their own populations in specialist skills needed for long-term development.
Education provides people with values and attitudes required for development processes. Literate, numerate populations can better understand actions needed for development and participate in deciding what actions their communities and countries should take.
Education acts as a unifying force that helps overcome class, ethnic and religious differences within countries. It gives populations common sets of values and ideas about their nation.
Many people in developing countries eagerly pursue education because they want to gain qualifications, improved employment opportunities, and higher social status. Education serves as an empowering tool for groups traditionally excluded from social mobility, particularly women and the poor.
Challenges with universal education
External aid and increased investment have led many countries to introduce universal education, but provision remains patchy. Some countries provide universal education for primary school ages (up to 11 years), others extend it to 14 or 16 years, while some still lack universal education policies.
Even where universal education exists as policy, not every child actually attends school. This occurs because of family commitments and needs - children may be required to work on family farms or contribute to household income through employment.
Many countries require parents to pay school fees for their children's education. Additionally, families must purchase books and other educational resources that governments don't provide, unlike in countries like the UK where these are state-supplied.
Educational expansion doesn't necessarily mean quality education. Much educational increase has been supplied by systems designed to meet basic needs of limited numbers. Basic education systems experience strain when expanded rapidly. Lessons aren't always high quality, and some education fails to provide sufficient useful knowledge.
Employment problems from educational expansion
While young people attend schools and colleges for education, they don't contribute to economic productivity during this time. Because more people study rather than work, governments receive less tax revenue while needing to spend more on educational provision.
Bright, educated people from rural areas often migrate to cities seeking employment opportunities. This contributes to over-urbanisation and urban overcrowding problems.
More educated citizens sometimes struggle to find appropriate employment in their home countries, or they earn more money by moving to countries with better job prospects. This creates 'brain drain' - the country loses its educated population and fails to develop because educated people leave to use their skills elsewhere.
Marxist dependency theory critique
Dependency theorists strongly oppose education that gives people values and attitudes needed for 'imperial-capitalist' (Western) development. They disapprove of education systems that train people for cultural imperialism.
Dependency theory views education as a tool for keeping populations culturally and economically dependent on developed countries. Rather than promoting genuine development, this education trains people for jobs that benefit transnational corporations and the developed world rather than their own countries.
Health
Health remains poor in developing countries compared to developed nations during the early 21st century. Good health care provision is essential both for protecting people and supporting a country's future development prospects.
Measuring health and education
David Morris developed the Physical Quality of Life Index (PQLI) in 1979. This index measures infant mortality, literacy and life expectancy, making it useful for sociologists concerned with development as a social issue rather than purely economic matter.
The PQLI allows comparison of trends across different countries, though problems exist in collecting reliable data for accurate measurements.
Factors affecting health in LEDCs
Poverty forces people to endure poor diets and inadequate public health systems, preventing them from accessing good quality health care. Universal health care remains rare in developing countries - people usually must pay to see doctors. There are also insufficient numbers of doctors and nurses available.
Poor health education in developing countries means many people, particularly those in traditional rural areas, don't understand how to prevent disease or lack awareness of basic treatments available to them.
Some drug companies sell medications in developing countries that have been banned in Western nations for safety reasons. Alternatively, companies may set prices for life-saving drugs so high that most people in LEDCs cannot afford them.
Western products may be used inappropriately in developing contexts. For example, baby formula milk receives heavy advertising in LEDCs, but mothers may lack access to clean water needed to prepare it safely, leading to infant deaths from infections.
Countries may pay insufficient attention to environmental factors affecting health and safety. The Bhopal poison gas leak of 1984 occurred because safety procedures were inadequate for the industrial facility.
Case study: HIV/AIDS in South Africa
Case Study: HIV/AIDS in South Africa
The HIV/AIDS epidemic in South Africa illustrates how multiple factors combine to create health crises:
- Insufficient health education in poor areas meant people didn't understand how HIV transmitted
- Clinics were often a day's walk away from rural communities
- Transnational drugs companies refused to allow local companies to produce cheaper versions of anti-HIV drugs, and courts banned this practice in 2001
- The South African government was reluctant to distribute anti-HIV drugs during the 1990s
Theoretical perspectives on health inequalities
Modernisation theorists and functionalists believe Western medicine is superior and that Western medicine and health education can solve problems of high infant mortality and low life expectancy. Rostow (1971) argued that high-tech medicine used in developed countries should be transferred to developing nations to provide quality health care.
Marxist Navarro (1976) believed high-tech Western health care shouldn't be the immediate priority for developing countries. Poor nations need to focus on basic health procedures to save lives and improve quality of life. Doctors from these countries should be encouraged to stay and work in their own nations rather than migrating to MEDCs for better pay.
Dependency theory blames colonialism and exploitation for health problems. Colonialism introduced European diseases to Africa, America and Asia. Colonial powers also replaced food crops with cash crops, resulting in malnutrition among local populations.
Gender
Sociologists, particularly feminists, have highlighted that women and men experience development in different ways, with women often facing additional barriers and disadvantages.
Gender inequalities in developing countries
Evidence from studies shows that women often receive worse treatment than men in many areas:
- Women have lower life expectancy than men in some countries (though usually women live longer than men globally)
- Women receive less pay than men and get less education than men
- Women's health is poorer than men's health, and women have less access to health care
- There's a higher chance of abortion if a foetus is female
- Women have very poor reproductive rights - they cannot choose whether to have children or how many children to have, because local religious attitudes oppose contraception and abortion
Measuring gender equality
The Gender Empowerment Measure (GEM) focuses on social indicators of gender equality, examining female and male participation in decision making, economic participation and economic power. It monitors whether women have the right to vote, how many women serve in parliament, how many women hold top management positions, and the GDP per capita of the female population.
The Gender-related Development Index (GDI) measures several development-related factors including life expectancy, literacy, years in school, number of women in work and women's income. While men still tend to have better income and literacy, women have improved in most measured categories. Women's literacy and numeracy have improved, and the chance of death during or after childbirth has fallen.
Technology and women's employment patterns
Swasti Mitter (1995) wrote about the impact of Information and Communication Technology (ICT) on female employment in LEDCs. She argues that computer technology can provide real advantages to women by allowing them to work from home and maintain flexible working hours.
Many ICT jobs outsourced from MEDCs to Newly Industrialised Countries go to women, such as call-centre positions. Mitter points out that many women in LEDCs like India, Malaysia and Brazil now work in ICT, but they're concentrated in lower-level positions rather than senior roles.
Feminist perspectives on development
Radical feminists see development as a tool making women more dependent upon men. They argue that TNCs actively seek to employ women because they're cheaper, more efficient and more docile. If women do experience improvement in their social position, such as greater life expectancy through better health care or increased income, it's because the patriarchy of the developed world allows it for productivity reasons.
Socialist feminists argue that socialism can create a society that treats men and women equally. They advocate for a socialist revolution that completely changes how people think about work, including 'men's jobs' and 'women's jobs', while transferring ownership of production means from employers to workers.
According to Marxist feminists, women may experience the negative effects of development more than men. Women face a dual burden of paid work and domestic responsibilities. When countries industrialise, men transition from one type of work (agriculture) to another (manufacturing), but women move from one form of work (housework and childcare) to two forms of work (housework and childcare plus paid employment outside the home).
Employment
Large international companies often relocate their factories, call centres and other facilities to developing countries because wages are cheaper there. This creates employment opportunities for local populations, but many argue that workers aren't treated fairly.
Why developing countries encourage TNC relocation
Labour costs are much lower in LEDCs than in developed countries. As a result, many transnational corporations (TNCs) prefer to establish factories in LEDCs or pay local companies in LEDCs to manufacture goods on their behalf.
Many LEDCs actively encourage TNCs through policies like establishing Export Processing Zones (EPZs) - special types of Free Trade Zones. In EPZs, companies may receive tax breaks, training grants, low regulation and low wage costs. Trade unions are often banned in these areas.
More than 100 countries in the developing world now operate these special economic zones.
Working conditions in export processing zones
Typical EPZ industries include garment-making and electronic goods assembly. Workers are usually not directly employed by TNCs but work for local manufacturers competing to win contracts from international companies. The manufacturers' primary concern involves keeping costs down, which can result in very poor working conditions.
Working hours are often long and pay is low. In the garment industry, workers in Sri Lanka received the lowest wages in 2013 at $68 per month on average, while workers in Thailand were better paid, earning $237 per month. European workers in Turkey doing similar work earned around $494 per month in 2014.
Health and safety issues and basic comforts like breaks or washrooms may be ignored. Many firms use flexible or casual labour, meaning workers have almost no job security and may be employed on short-term contracts lasting only a week or daily.
Highly paid jobs like marketing and design usually remain at TNC sites in MEDCs. Workers in LEDC factories tend to have basic unskilled positions with very limited training or career advancement opportunities.
In EPZs, women usually comprise the majority of employees - sometimes up to 90%. Because women typically earn less than men in LEDCs, this can be argued as TNCs profiting from women's lower social status. Some companies in EPZs also employ child labour.
When trade unions are banned or restricted, workers find it difficult to campaign for better pay or working conditions. There are often many people willing to work, so employers have no incentive to offer better wages.
Arguments for and against export processing zones
Marxists like Fröbel (1980) are highly critical of EPZs, viewing them as a new form of exploitative colonialism. However, globalists argue that EPZs benefit world consumers by keeping prices down.
While wages in EPZs appear low compared to what people earn for the same work in industrialised nations, they're often relatively good when compared to average wages in the developing countries where they're located.
Key Points to Remember:
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Population growth occurs much faster in developing countries, creating debates about whether this helps or hinders development progress
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Education can improve living standards and empower disadvantaged groups, but faces challenges with access, quality and employment mismatches
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Health inequalities persist between developed and developing countries, with poverty, education and access being key factors affecting health outcomes
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Gender inequalities mean women often face additional disadvantages in the development process, though technology and changing attitudes create new opportunities
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Employment through TNCs and export processing zones creates jobs but often under poor working conditions that benefit companies more than workers