Global North and Global South
Global North and Global South are terms denoting a method of grouping countries based on their defining characteristics with regard to socioeconomics. The terms refer to developed and developing/least developed countries respectively. According to UN Trade and Development, the Global South broadly comprises Africa, Latin America and the Caribbean, Asia, and Oceania. Most of the Global South's countries are commonly identified as lacking in their standard of living, which includes having lower incomes, high levels of poverty, high population growth rates, inadequate housing, limited educational opportunities, and deficient health systems, among other issues. Additionally, these countries' cities are characterized by their poor infrastructure. Opposite to the Global South is the Global North, which the UNCTAD describes as broadly comprising Northern America and Europe, Israel, Japan, South Korea, Australia, and New Zealand. Consequently the two groups do not correspond to the Northern Hemisphere or the Southern Hemisphere, as many of the Global South's countries are geographically located in the north and vice-versa.
The Global North and the Global South are often defined in terms of their differing levels of wealth, economic development, income inequality, and strength of democracy, as well as by their political freedom and economic freedom, as defined by a variety of freedom indices. Countries of the Global North tend to be wealthier, and export technologically advanced manufactured products, among other characteristics. In contrast, countries of the Global South tend to be relatively poorer, and heavily dependent on their largely agrarian-based economic primary sectors. Some scholars suggest that the inequality gap between the Global North and the Global South has narrowed since globalization. Others contend that the Global South has instead become poorer vis-à-vis the Global North.
The Global South classification, as used by governmental and developmental organizations, was first introduced as a more open and value-free alternative to Third World, and likewise potentially "valuing" terms such as developed and developing. Countries of the Global South are also described as being newly industrialized or in the process of industrializing. Many of them are current or former subjects of colonialism. Since World War II, "South–South cooperation" to "challenge the political and economic dominance of the North" has become more prominent among the Global South's countries. It has become popular due to the geographical migration of manufacturing and production activity from the Global North to the Global South, and has influenced diplomatic policies of the Global South's more powerful countries, such as China. These contemporary economic trends have enhanced the potential of economic growth and industrialization in the Global South.
Definition
The terms Global North and Global South are not strictly geographical, and are not "an image of the world divided by the equator, separating richer countries from their poorer counterparts." Rather, geography should be more readily understood as economic and migratory, in the "wider context of globalization or global capitalism."In general, definitions for Global North and Global South, do not refer to the geographical North or the geographical South. The Global North broadly comprises Northern America and Europe, Israel, Japan, South Korea, Australia, and New Zealand, as per the UNCTAD. The Global South broadly comprises Africa, Latin America and the Caribbean, Asia excluding Israel, Japan, and South Korea, and Oceania excluding Australia and New Zealand, also according to the UNCTAD. Some, such as Australian sociologists Fran Collyer and Raewyn Connell, have argued that Australia and New Zealand are marginalized in similar ways to other Global South countries, due to their geographical isolation and location in the Southern Hemisphere.
The term Global North is often used interchangeably with developed countries, whereas the term Global South with developing countries.
Characteristically, most countries in the Global South are commonly identified as lacking in their standard of living, these include having: lower incomes, high levels of poverty, high population growth rates, limited educational opportunities, deficient health care systems, among other issues. Also, cities in the Global South are identified for their poor infrastructure. Economies of the Global North are diversified, whereas the agriculture sector is the major contributor to economic activity in the Global South.
Development of the terms
used the term global south in 1969, writing in Catholic journal Commonweal in a special issue on the Vietnam War. Oglesby argued that centuries of northern "dominance over the global south converged to produce an intolerable social order."The term gained appeal throughout the second half of the 20th century, which rapidly accelerated in the early 21st century. It appeared in fewer than two dozen publications in 2004, but in hundreds of publications by 2013. The emergence of the new term meant looking at the troubled realities of its predecessors, i.e.: Third World or developing world. The term Global South, in contrast, was intended to be less hierarchical. Compared to the alternatives, the term has been deemed useful as it constitutes a lens through which this group of countries keep seeing and narrating their problems in a distinctive way vis-à-vis "developed" countries in Europe, North America and Asia.
The idea of categorizing countries by their economic and developmental status began during the Cold War with the classifications of East and West. The Soviet Union and China represented the East, and the United States and their allies represented the West. The term Third World came into parlance in the second half of the twentieth century. It originated in a 1952 article by Alfred Sauvy entitled "Trois Mondes, Une Planète". Early definitions of the Third World emphasized its exclusion from the east–west conflict of the Cold War as well as the ex-colonial status and poverty of the peoples it comprised.
File:Heads of State Cancun Summit 1981.jpg|right|thumb|Heads of state and heads of government at the 1981 North–South Summit in Cancun, Mexico
There have been efforts to mobilize the Third World as a political entity. The 1955 Bandung Conference was an early meeting of Third World states in which an alternative to alignment with either the Eastern or Western Blocs was promoted. Following this, the first Non-Aligned Summit was organized in 1961. Contemporaneously, a mode of economic criticism which separated the world economy into "core" and "periphery" was developed and given expression in a project for political reform which "moved the terms 'North' and 'South' into the international political lexicon."
In 1973, the pursuit of a New International Economic Order which was to be negotiated between the North and South was initiated at the Non-Aligned Summit held in Algiers. Also in 1973, the oil embargo initiated by Arab OPEC countries as a result of the Yom Kippur War caused an increase in world oil prices, with prices continuing to rise throughout the decade. This contributed to a worldwide recession which resulted in industrialized nations increasing economically protectionist policies and contributing less aid to the less developed countries of the South. The slack was taken up by Western banks, which provided substantial loans to Third World countries. However, many of these countries were not able to pay back their debt, which led the IMF to extend further loans to them on the condition that they undertake certain liberalizing reforms. This policy, which came to be known as structural adjustment, and was institutionalized by international financial institutions and Western governments, represented a break from the Keynesian approach to foreign aid which had been the norm from the end of the Second World War.
After 1987, reports on the negative social impacts that structural adjustment policies had led IFIs to supplement structural adjustment policies with targeted anti-poverty projects. Following the end of the Cold War and the break-up of the Soviet Union, some Second World countries joined the First World, and others joined the Third World. A new and simpler classification was needed. Use of the terms "North" and "South" became more widespread.
Brandt Line
The Brandt Line is a visual depiction of the north–south divide, proposed by West German former Chancellor Willy Brandt in the 1980s in the report titled North–South: A Programme for Survival which was later known as the Brandt Report. This line divides the world at a latitude of approximately 30° North, passing between the United States and Mexico, north of Africa and the Middle East, climbing north over China and Mongolia, then dipping south to include Japan, Australia, and New Zealand in the "Rich North". As of 2023 the Brandt line has been criticised for being outdated, yet is still regarded as a helpful way to visualise global inequalities.Uses of the term Global South
Global South "emerged in part to aid countries in the southern hemisphere to work in collaboration on political, economic, social, environmental, cultural, and technical issues." This is called South–South cooperation, a "political and economical term that refers to the long-term goal of pursuing world economic changes that mutually benefit countries in the Global South and lead to greater solidarity among the disadvantaged in the world system." The hope is that countries within the Global South will "assist each other in social, political, and economical development, radically altering the world system to reflect their interests and not just the interests of the Global North in the process." It is guided by the principles of "respect for national sovereignty, national ownership, independence, equality, non-conditionality, non-interference in domestic affairs, and mutual benefit." Countries using this model of South–South cooperation see it as a "mutually beneficial relationship that spreads knowledge, skills, expertise and resources to address their development challenges such as high population pressure, poverty, hunger, disease, environmental deterioration, conflict and natural disasters." These countries also work together to deal with "cross border issues such as environmental protection, HIV/AIDS", and the movement of capital and labor.Social psychiatrist Vincenzo Di Nicola has applied the Global South as a bridge between the critiques globalization and the gaps and limitations of the Global Mental Health Movement, invoking Boaventura de Sousa Santos' notion of "epistemologies of the South" to create a new epistemology for social psychiatry.