The Contextual Effect of Dependency on Economic Growth and Sectoral Inequality: A Cross-National Study Toward an Integration of Internal and External Factors in Third World Development
Lew, Seok-Choon
This item is only available for download by members of the University of Illinois community. Students, faculty, and staff at the U of I may log in with your NetID and password to view the item. If you are trying to access an Illinois-restricted dissertation or thesis, you can request a copy through your library's Inter-Library Loan office or purchase a copy directly from ProQuest.
Permalink
https://hdl.handle.net/2142/71015
Description
Title
The Contextual Effect of Dependency on Economic Growth and Sectoral Inequality: A Cross-National Study Toward an Integration of Internal and External Factors in Third World Development
Author(s)
Lew, Seok-Choon
Issue Date
1986
Department of Study
Sociology
Discipline
Sociology
Degree Granting Institution
University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign
Degree Name
Ph.D.
Degree Level
Dissertation
Keyword(s)
Sociology, Social Structure and Development
Abstract
Internal causes of national underdevelopment drawn from contending arguments are not necessarily contradictory of, but rather complementary to, the external causes of underdevelopment highlighted by the dependency/world-system theory. These internal causes could be integrated into quantitative studies as contextual effects to clarify the current confusion in cross-national findings. This study considers four internal causal factors argued by contending theories in addition to the external factor emphasized by dependency/world-system theory in an analysis of economic development. Interaction effects between internal and external factors are investigated. The four internal factors considered are the level of available human resources, the level of available natural resources, the level of domestic capital formation, and the strength of the state. The one external factor is the level of dependency. A longitudinal research design is adopted. The dependent variables of economic growth and sectoral inequality are observed at two time points, and the ratio and the difference of them are calculated to be examined separately. Analyses are based on cross-national data for the years of 1965 and 1975; they include a maximum of 155 nations.
The results indicate that: (1) dependency interacts with state strength in explaining a ratio measure of economic growth; (2) dependency interacts respectively with natural resources, domestic capital formation, and state strength in explaining a difference measure of economic growth; (3) dependency interacts respectively with human and natural resources in explaining a ratio measure of sectoral inequality change; and (4) dependency interacts with human resources in explaining a difference measure of sectoral inequality change. These findings suggest that the current inconsistent empirical findings about the effect of dependency on economic development may have been due to model specification. A non-linear model is found to be more appropriate to investigate the effect of dependency contextually with internal factors.
In addition, a multidimensional cluster analysis based on the above internal and external characteristics of nations is incorporated into the study to categorize individual nations into contextually homogeneous groups. It is found that the resulting classification scheme is useful in providing empirical evidence for the argument that the modern world-system is composed of three distinctive structural positions of nations: Core, Semiperiphery, and Periphery. (Abstract shortened with permission of author.)
Use this login method if you
don't
have an
@illinois.edu
email address.
(Oops, I do have one)
IDEALS migrated to a new platform on June 23, 2022. If you created
your account prior to this date, you will have to reset your password
using the forgot-password link below.
