Second World

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

This is an old revision of this page, as edited by Tajotep (talk | contribs) at 11:27, 29 September 2018 (→‎top). The present address (URL) is a permanent link to this revision, which may differ significantly from the current revision.

This article is about the western political concept. For the Maoist political concept, see Three Worlds Theory. For the online virtual world, see Second Life.
"Communist world" redirects here. For a worldwide communist society, see World communism.
The "Three Worlds" of the Cold War (between 30 April and 24 June 1975)
  First World: Countries aligned with the Western Bloc (i.e., NATO and allies), led by the United States
  Second World: Countries aligned with the Eastern Bloc (i.e., Warsaw Pact, China, and allies), led by the Soviet Union
  Third World: The Non-Aligned Movement, led by India and Yugoslavia, and other neutral countries

The Second World is the former industrial socialist states (formally the Eastern Bloc) largely encompassing territories under the influence of the Soviet Union. Following World War II, there were 19 communist states, and after the fall of the Soviet Union, only five socialist states remained: China, North Korea, Cuba, Laos, and Vietnam. Along with "First World" and "Third World", the term was used to divide the states of Earth into three broad categories.

The concept of "Second World" was a construct of the Cold War and the term is still largely used to describe former communist countries that are between poverty and prosperity, many of which are now capitalist states. Subsequently the actual meaning of the terms "First World", "Second World" and "Third World" changed from being based on political ideology to an economic definition.[1] The three-world theory has been criticized as crude and relatively outdated for its nominal ordering (1; 2; 3) and sociologists have instead used the words "developed", "developing", and "underdeveloped" as replacement terms for global stratification (which in turn have been criticized as displaying a colonialist mindset) [2] —nevertheless, the three-world theory is still popular in contemporary literature and media. This might also cause semantic variation of the term between describing a region's political entities and its people.[3]

See also

References

  1. ^ Margaret L. Andersen; Howard Francis Taylor (2006). Sociology: Understanding a Diverse Society. Thomson/Wadsworth. p. 250. ISBN 978-0-534-61716-5.
  2. ^ Silver, Marc. "If You Shouldn't Call It The Third World, What Should You Call It?" NPR, 4 January 2015.
  3. ^ Giddens, Anthony (2006). Sociology. Polity. ISBN 9780745633794.
Retrieved from "https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Second_World&oldid=861704736"