Features of the Traditional
State:
Before modern
industrialism, this is the only type of society in history wherein a significant
proportion of the population was not directly engaged in the production of food.
What does this
mean? It means that before the traditional state everybody worked for the production
of food. Now in the traditional state the simple division of labor disappears.
What was this
simple division of labor? Men hunted, women gathered and attended the children,
or that men did the hard physical labor and the women did the household chores.
The most important separation of tasks was between men and women, it was a division
of labor by sex – the activities of women being mainly confined to the household
and the fields.
So what happened
to the work men did? In the traditional state a more complicated occupational system
existed. Men now had specialized trades such as being a merchant, a noble (aristocrat),
government administrator and soldier.
Now because
we have extreme variations in power and wealth, social classes were created. The
basic division of classes was between aristocratic groups and the remainder of the
population. The ruler was at the head of a “ruling class” that maintained the exclusive
right to hold the higher social positions. The members of this class usually lived
in considerable material comfort or luxury.
Now these states
sought the development of professional armies. The Roman army, for example, was
a highly disciplined and intensively trained body of men, and was the foundation
on which the expansion of the Roman Empire was built. In wars between states casualties
were far higher than they had even been before.
The Modern World: Industrial
Societies
Traditional
states have now disappeared from the face of the earth. Yes still hunting and gathering,
pastoral and agrarian societies but only found in isolated territories.
What happened
to this society that dominated just 2 centuries ago? Industrialization – machine
production through steam or electricity. Now we have Industrial Societies or modern
societies.
This happened
during Industrial Revolution in 18th century England and complex technological
changes changed the means by which people gained their livelihood. Discoveries and
inventions in science improved production methods and also provoked new discoveries.
Before this, even the most advanced traditional civilizations were engaged in working
on the land. Most of these people still worked on the land. Now industrialized,
few people work the land, more work in factories, offices or shops. Now 90% of people
live in towns and cities were most jobs are found and job opportunities are created.
Personal life:
in the cities social life becomes more impersonal and anonymous than before, and
many of our day-to-day encounters are with strangers rather than with individuals
known to us. Our personal life is highly influenced by business corporations or
government agencies.
Nation States
There is a difference
between the terms nation, state, and country, even though the words are often used
interchangeably.
Country and State are synonymous terms that both apply to self-governing
political entities. A state is a territory defined by political boundaries with
its own set of laws. People usually call states countries.
A nation, however, is a group of people who share the same
culture but do not have sovereignty. A nation is a group of people who share a characteristic.
So, a nation-state
is; a state in which the inhabitants have the same culture or belong to the same
nation of people. Japan is the best example. Japan is mostly inhabited by Japanese
people who have the same religion, language and other culture defining characteristics.
Most other states are multinational states, like the USA. These are states where
there is a variety of cultures within one state.
A nation-state
is not the same thing as a city-state. The Vatican would be like a city-state or
Washington D.C.
A nation-state
is a state, or country, that has defined borders and territory. It is additionally
a country in which a nation of principally the same type of people exists, organized
by either race or cultural background. In the nation-state, generally, everyone
would speak the same language, probably practice the same or similar types of religion,
and share a set of cultural, “national,” values.
The US is not
a nation-state because of its multiple ethnicities, numbers of religions practiced,
and different cultural norms. Even though citizens of the US share the same borders
and territory, they do not, in the sense of the nation-state, share a common nationality.
Another way
in which a nation-state cannot exist is when there is a defined ethnic and cultural
group that exists without territorial borders and complete right of ownership to
those borders. For example, when immigrants to the US declared the country to be
a state, numerous Native American tribes were nations without being states. The
borders of the various Native American nations were disregarded by the larger
US state, resulting in repeated relocation of these nations to other areas and territories.
These territories were only held at the permission of the US. Today, some tribes
do have defined borders but they still in some cases may be subject to the laws
of the US, making them not fully nation-states.
In fact, most
countries do not completely fall within the definition of the nation-state, since
most countries have immigrants. Once immigrants come to a country, especially in
large numbers, the nation-state can no longer exist. Countries with only a small
number of immigrants may still be seen as containing predominantly the same ethnicity
and shared culture and may thus be considered as approaching the theoretical nation-state.
Iceland is considered
almost an ideal nation-state since immigration to Iceland is quite low. Japan also
comes close to being a nation-state because the sense of national identity and shared
language is very strong. It is not coincidental that both of these countries are
islands and thus less “crossing of the border” can exist.
The desire to
establish a nation-state can be one of the most devastating ones and may result
in either mass eviction of other nationalities or ethnic cleansing. Hitler attempted
to establish Germany as a nation-state by first exiling Jews, and then ultimately,
by killing the majority of Jewish residents in Germany, and in other countries he
conquered like Poland. Attempting to enforce a nation-state where none truly exists
often results in high numbers of deaths for large minority populations and a lack
of humanity to the extreme.
First, Second and Third World
Societies
Origin – Colonialism
was central to shaping the social map of the globe. This development and expansion
led to the conquest of many parts of the world, radically changing long-established
social systems and cultures. This process was associated with colonialism – the
imposition of Western government and Western control.
First
World
The term "First
World" refers to so called developed, capitalist, industrial countries, roughly,
a bloc of countries aligned with the United States after World War II, with more
or less common political and economic interests: North America, Western Europe,
Japan and Australia.
Second
World
"Second
World" refers to the former communist-socialist, industrial states, (formerly
the Eastern bloc, the territory and sphere of influence of the Union of Soviet Socialists
Republic) today: Russia, Eastern Europe (e.g., Poland) and some of the Turk States
(e.g., Kazakhstan) as well as China.
Third
World
"Third
World" are all the other countries, today often used to roughly describe the
developing countries of Africa, Asia and Latin America. The term Third World includes
as well capitalist (e.g., Venezuela) and communist (e.g., North Korea) countries,
as very rich (e.g., Saudi Arabia) and very poor (e.g., Mali) countries.
Third World
Countries classified by various indices: their Political Rights and Civil Liberties,
the Gross National Income (GNI) and Poverty of countries, the Human Development
of countries (HDI), and the Freedom of Information within a country.
What makes a nation third world?
Despite ever
evolving definitions, the concept of the third world serves to identify countries
that suffer from high infant mortality, low economic development, high levels of
poverty, low utilization of natural resources, and heavy dependence on industrialized
nations. These are the developing and technologically less advanced nations of Asia,
Africa, Oceania, and Latin America. Third world nations tend to have economies dependent
on the developed countries and are generally characterized as poor with unstable
governments and having high rates of population growth, illiteracy, and disease.
A key factor is the lack of a middle class — with impoverished millions in a vast
lower economic class and a very small elite upper class controlling the country's
wealth and resources. Most third world nations also have a very large foreign debt.
Fourth
World ??!!
The term "Fourth
World" first came into use in 1974 with the publication of Shuswap Chief George
Manuel's:
The fourth world: an Indian reality (amazon link to the book), the
term refers to nations (cultural entities, ethnic groups) of indigenous peoples
living within or across state boundaries (nation states). See Native American Indians
Today
Today these
groupings are obsolete. However, "First World" is still used for
developed countries, and "Third World" for those that are
underdeveloped. There are no remaining countries that fit the original
definition of Second World, since existent communist countries are either
severely underdeveloped like Cuba and North Korea, or aren't really following a
communist economic model like China.
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