Essay On Third World And Urbanization

There are many differences surrounding the urbanization in the Third World versus urbanization in the First World. Although many of these developing countries are highly urbanized they all share a pattern of uneven development that is much more extreme than that found in the older, developed nations (Gottdiener & Hutchison, 2011, p. 283). According to Smith and Timberlake (1993), the main differences between developed and developing nations are factors such as: elite power, state policies, integration into the global economy, and the effects of class structure. The type of government at the national level plays a huge role in the success or failure of development schemes in many developing countries. (Gottdiener & Hutchison, 2011, p. 287).

Because of the population explosion, rural areas have been hard-pressed to grow enough food for domestic consumption, and the standard of living in rural areas has declined drastically since the 1950’s in many developing countries, as there are simply too many mouths to feed (Gottdiener & Hutchison, 2011, p. 288). Due to this inability of rural agricultural efforts to grow enough food for consumption, many decide to flee to the cities. Another huge difference between Third World countries and First World countries is that in many of these developing nations there is an unbalanced pattern of urbanization that places such as the United States just doesn’t have. Developed nations have a much more even distribution of urbanization and don’t have things like primate cities. According to Gottdiener and Hutchison (2011), primate cities are, “…over urbanized, excessively populated, and is the center for most investment and economic growth, while retaining a relatively under urbanized interior with no large cities” (Pg.

Until about the mid 19th century, Sao Paulo was a small trading town and slowly continued to grow in importance due to coffee exports (The challenge of slums global report on human settlements, 2003, p. 226). The city eventually became socially divided between the wealthy and the poor with the wealthy concentrated in the higher central districts and the poor on the floodplains and along the railways (The challenge of slums global report on human settlements, 2003, p. 226). To make this socio-spatial segregation even more prominent, urbanization increased dramatically between 1930 and 1980 when there was an intense process of migration from the countryside. Throughout the 1980’s there was major industrial deconcentration that caused medium-sized Brazilian cities to grow at rates much above those of the metropolises. In large metropolises, this caused lower central area population growth rates or even a decrease (The challenge of slums global report on human settlements, 2003, p. 227). This transformation from an industrialized city to a more service metropolis furthered the economic and social polarization and quickly grew the income gap between the richest and the poorest. Also during this time, there was an increasing growth of shantytowns within the urban periphery (which in Brazil are called favelas). According to The challenge of slums global report on human settlements (2003),