GEOG2400 SPRING 2003 THE GEOGRAPHY OF WORLD DEVELOPMENT

1
GEOG2400 SPRING 2003 THE GEOGRAPHY OF WORLD
DEVELOPMENT

• Focus on Regions
• The European Region

Element 3 Sophomore GE Cluster Global Wealth,
Poverty and Inequality
2
Considerable Variation in Economic Standings

• Eastern Europe is economically less developed
  than the West.
• Lower levels of resources and historical
  exploitation while subsumed in a larger empire
  are the main factors.

3
Geography of a long life

• Where you are born in Europe can have a big
  impact on how long you live.
• Social, economic and environmental conditions in
  the Eastern (old soviet) nations, takes ten years
  off ones life.
• The population is universally well educated
  however.

4
Eastern Europe catching up?

• Following World War II, the Russians, advancing
  on Germany from the east, maintained control over
  eastern Europe as a buffer against the West.
• Through communist planning, the economies of the
  region were coordinated, subordinated to the
  Russian economy (a kind of internal
  core-periphery dependency arrangement)
• Most economic activity was state-owned and
  markets were guaranteed, not based on free-market
  demand and supply, but on quota systems.
• Farming was taken out of private landowners hands
  and collectivized, creating factory farming in
  which farmers were reduced to assembly workers,
  producing for the state which decided what would
  be planted and collected and allocated all
  harvests centrally.

5
Legacy of Inefficiency

• Guaranteed markets and quota based production,
  coupled with heavy pressure to demonstrate the
  glories of communism, led to over-production,
  quantity not quality, and short-cuts, especially
  in terms of environmental management.
• At the fall of communism, Eastern European
  industry was over-capacity, uncompetitive and
  industrial communities were environmentally
  devastated toxic wastelands, polluted water,
  polluted air, and so forth.
• Subsidized energy from Soviet Russia dried up
  creating rising production costs.
• Focus on heavy industry steel, trucks,
  machinery, etc. over consumer goods (and those
  that were made were inferior quality) left
  Eastern Europe unprepared for capitalism either
  to satisfy internal demand or compete in an
  international marketplace.

6
The Dual Economies

• With the yolk of communisms removed, Eastern
  Europe has been free to embrace capitalism and
  move ahead.
• Geographical and other differences mean, however,
  that not all have the means to do so.
• Europe is rapidly becoming a three-tier system
  economically and socially the rich EU nations,
  the advancing Eastern nations (led by Czech Rep.,
  Hungary, Slovenia and Poland), and the stagnating
  nations (with Macedonia, Moldova and Albania at
  the bottom).
• The other nations of Eastern Europe hover between
  the two lower levels, their futures uncertain, in
  part a function of their ability to deal with
  ethnic tensions, corruption, and political
  instability.

7
The Balkans Clash of Cultures?
8
The Issue of the Balkans

• The recent war in Bosnia and continued tensions
  in Croatia, Montenegro and other small nations
  that were formerly parts of the Austro-Hungarian
  and Ottoman (Turkish) empires will remain
  problematic for Europe.
• Ethnic and religious rivalries, including those
  between Christian and Muslim, are fierce in the
  region.
• As seen in Yugoslavia (Serbia), when allowed
  free-rein, the worst of these rivalries can
  result in genocide and other atrocities.
• The EU will have to deal with continued
  nationalist forces and the instability this
  creates as it adds members and considers whether
  a super-Europe is indeed a feasibility.
• Even with the richer Eastern European nations,
  the economic disparities across the spread of
  nations will be a significant challenge to the
  workings of the union.