Are they developed countries, or colonisers?

In our modern world, there seems to be an almost concrete line the sand; a line which rarely ever changes. The line between developed and undeveloped, or in more crude terms, the line between the rich and the poor. The richer countries oft have far better living conditions, larger GDPs, and drastically better opportunities for their people. Poorer countries on the other hand often have abysmal living conditions, failing economies and lack the resources or investment to create opportunities for their people, leading the most experienced and valuable workers seeking jobs abroad in order to support themselves financially. 

The point of this article is to identify the reasons by which undeveloped countries remain undeveloped and developed countries keep their strangle hold upon the global economy. 

The Classification of Developed and Developing

In the World Economic Situation and Prospects Statistical Annex, UN/DESA classified all countries and the Chinese Province of Taiwan in 3 key groups– Developed, Transitioning, or Developing. The placement of these countries was determined by ‘general economic conditions’. Developed Countries were those who showed indicators of a strong economy, developing those who showed indicators of a weak one and transitioning those who had indicators of both.
Within the report Canada, Japan, France, Germany, Italy, The United Kingdom and The United States of America are identified as world’s ‘7 major developed economies’.
These classifications will found a majority of the general framework of classifications to be used in this article. 

Additionally, we will make use of the UNCTAD list of Least Developed Countries in order to roughly estimate which countries are doing the worst economically.

Patterns in Developing and Developed countries

Of the 36 countries classified as ‘developed’ within the 2022 World Economic Situation and Prospects Statistical annex, 2 were from North-America, 31 were from Europe and 1 was from Asia. A total of 0 African countries were included as ‘developed countries’, and not without reason. Africa as a continent was, obviously, colonized for a long period of time mainly by the British and French (both of whom hold a place on the list of ‘most developed economies’ in the annex). Shifting our attention to the list of Least Developed countries will only confirm this trend with a majority of the ‘least developed countries’ being in Africa. 

Within the list of Least Developed Countries, there are no European, North American (excluding Haiti) or South American countries. Even Oceania is largely exempt from the list, other than a few island nations such as Kiribati. 

Here, we see the line in the sand for what it is; a line being colonizer and colonized. It is the empires of old who still wield a majority of the economic power in our supposedly ‘decolonised’ world. Following Africa with the second most largest number of least developed countries is Asia, particularly those regions of Asia which suffered heavily under colonialist rule or are the victims of neo-colonialism.

Explaining the Outliers

Within the patterns of developed and developing countries we notice that a majority of undeveloped countries lay in Africa and Asia, two continents which were widely colonized by European powers. Hence, a majority of developed countries are in Europe or North America. However, there are a few important outliers. 

Haiti

Haiti is the only North-American to be classified as ‘least developed’ (even though the report classifies it’s region as ‘Caribbean’). This seems odd, considering that it’s fellow Caribbean island nations (Cuba, Barbados, etc) managed to evade the list however the reason for it’s economic failure blatantly obvious once you look at the history of Haiti. Being the first independent republic in the Americas after a brutal war against the British  and also being majority black since it’s founding, Haiti was never set up for success. It’s non-white and defiant nature meant that the British were kean on crushing it’s economy and ensuring that it would never prosper. Additionally, after the death of their initial leaders, factionalism and infighting quickly overtook the Haitians, leading to Haiti becoming a de-facto British protectorate. Overtime, the lack of development in Haiti caught up with the nation, explaining it’s status among the world’s least developed.

Japan

Japan is the only Asian country to make it onto the list of developed countries. It also makes it onto the list of the top 7 leading developed countries of the world and has the world’s 3rd largest economy. But why? The answer to this question, again, lies in Japan’s history. Japan was never colonized by Western powers, at least formally, and at the outbreak of World War 2 it was a dominant power in East Asia. This was due to the fact that the powers which had historically overshadowed Japan were facing trouble adapting to the new age. India was under British rule and the crumbling Qing Dynasty in China failed to modernize, leaving Japan on their own. They sought rapid expansion in the region, both to enhance their own power, and to curb the power of the Europeans. This is why the Japanese entered an alliance with Nazi Germany and fascist Italy. During World War 2, the Japanese committed many atrocities and benefited immensely from the spoils of war. However, afterwards, unlike the Germans and Italians, their government was not forced to disband. The Japanese government of today is contiguous with the Japanese government of WW2, retaining their emperor and still does not recognise their actions in WW2 as war crimes, despite the UN saying otherwise. Many top ranking Japanese officials were given diplomatic immunity in exchange for submitting to Western hegemony, which proved to be useful once the Communist Party of China took control over the mainland and the West began to see Japan as a valuable ally against the CCP. Therefore, Japans economy and government were allowed to continue on, without anything more than a slap on the wrist, in order to protect Western, primarily American, interests in the region. Hence, we can say that the only reason Japan’s economy today is so prosperous is because of the extensive war profiteering done during WW2 and the lack of any economic punishments done after. These funds, along with foreign investments done after the end of the World War, led to the rise of the Japanese economy.

Conclusion

There is an undeniable link between countries which partake in imperialism and those countries whom today hold a high economic standing. Those countries who took advantage of others, imperialised or colonized others, and profiteered from the losses of others are substantially better off than those who didn’t. These countries (developed) are often those who have the largest says in international politics and decision making, therefore it really begs the question, should we be letting colonizers make the shots?