CIT COLLEGES OF PANIQUI FOUNDATION INC.
Paniqui, Tarlac
Bachelor of Secondary Education - Social Studies
TOPIC 3 - Diversity Among Nations
At the end of these weeks, the preservice teacher (PST) should be able to:
a. explain the historical, political and economic background of countries with emphasis on diversity among Nations.
Diversity means understanding that each individual is unique,
and recognizing their individual differences. These differences can
be along the dimensions of race, gender, ethnicity, gender and
sexual orientation.
These are the critical components for structural diversity of
nations:
A. Historical Background
Most African and Asian nations were at one time or other
colonies of Western European countries, primarily Britain and
France but also Belgium, the Netherlands, Germany, Portugal, and
Spain. The economic structures of these nations, as well as their
educational and social institutions, have typically been modeled on
those of their former colonial rulers. Countries like those in Africa
that only recently gained their independence are therefore likely to
be more concerned with consolidating and evolving their own
national economic and political structures than with simply
promoting rapid economic development. Their policies (e.g., the
rapid Africanization of former colonial-held civil service jobs) may
consequently reflect a greater interest in these immediate political
issues.
Perhaps more important, the European colonial powers had a
dramatic and long- lasting impact on the economies and political
and institutional structures of their African and Asian colonies by
their introduction of three powerful and tradition-shattering ideas:
private property, personal taxation, and the requirement that taxes
be paid in money rather than in kind. As we will discover later, these
ideas combined to erode the autonomy of local communities and to
expose their people to many new forms of potential exploitation.
In Latin America, a longer history of political independence plus
a more shared colonial heritage (Spanish and Portuguese) has
meant that in spite of geographic and demographic diversity, the
countries possess relatively similar economic, social, and cultural
institutions and face similar problems. In Asia, different colonial
heritages and the diverse cultural traditions of the indigenous
peoples have combined to create different institutional and social
patterns in countries such as India (British), the Philippines
(Spanish and American), Vietnam (French), and Indonesia (Dutch).
B. Size and Income Level
The sheer physical size of a country, the size of its population,
and its level of national income per capita are important
determinants of its economic potential and major factors
differentiating one Third World nation from another.
The World Bank assigns the world’s economies to four income
groups—low, lower-middle, upper-middle, and high- income
countries. The assignment on Gross National Income (GNI) per
capita (current US$) is calculated using the Atlas method. The
classification is updated each year on July 1st.
The classifications change for two reasons: In each country,
factors such as economic growth, inflation, exchange rates, and
population growth influence GNI per capita. Revisions to national
accounts methods and data can also influence GNI per capita. To
keep the income classification thresholds fixed in real terms, they
are adjusted annually for inflation. The Special Drawing Rights
(SDR) deflator is used which is a weighted average of the GDP
deflators of China, Japan, the United Kingdom, the United States,
and the Euro Area.
Of the 145 developing countries that are full members of the
United Nations, 90 have fewer than 15 million people, 83 fewer than
5 million. Large and populated nations like Brazil, India, Egypt, and
Nigeria exist side by side with small countries like Paraguay, Nepal,
Jordan, and Chad. Large size usually presents advantages of
diverse resource endowment, large potential markets, and a lesser
dependence on foreign sources of materials and products. But it
also creates problems of administrative control, national cohesion,
and regional imbalances. As we shall see that there is no necessary
relationship between a country's size, its level of per capita national
income, and the degree of equality or inequality in its distribution of
that income.
C. Resources
Country's potential for economic growth is greatly influenced by
its endowments of physical resources (its land, minerals, and other
raw materials) and human resources (both numbers of people and
their level of skills).
The natural resources of the Philippines include copper, timber,
nickel, petroleum, silver, gold, cobalt, and salt. Most of the country’s
metallic minerals, including gold, iron ore, lead, zinc, chromite, and
copper, are drawn from major deposits on the islands of Luzon and
Mindanao.
The Visayas are the principal source limestone for cement,
marble, asphalt, salt, sulfur, asbestos, guano, gypsum, phosphate,
and silica. Petroleum and natural gas are extracted from fields off
the northwest coast of Palawan. In the realm of human resource
endowments, not only are sheer numbers of people and their skill
levels are important, but so also are their cultural outlooks, attitudes
toward work, and desire for self-of nonmetallic minerals, including
improvement. The level of administrative skills will often determine
the ability of the public sector to alter the structure of production and
the time it takes for such structural alteration to occur. The Human
Resources of the Philippines Aside from natural resources is one of
the bases of economic development. Its people are the most
important resource of any country. It is important to understand how
people utilize and develop natural resources based on their
character, diligence, and creativity. In fact, humans serve as the
“driver” of the world since the direction of it depends on them.
The current population of the Philippines is 110,663,267 as of
Wednesday, March 31, 2021, based on World meter elaboration of
the latest United Nations data. The Philippines population is
equivalent to 1.41% of the total world population. The Philippines
ranks number 13 in the list of countries (and dependencies) by
population.
In the realm of human resource endowments, not only are sheer
numbers of people and their skill levels important, but so also are
their cultural outlooks, attitudes toward work, and desire for self-
improvement.
Moreover, the level of administrative skills will often determine
the ability of the public sector to alter the structure of production and
the time it takes for such structural alteration to occur. This involves
the whole complex of interrelationships between culture, tradition,
religion, and ethnic and tribal fragmentation or cohesion. Thus, the
Major 13: Comparative Economic Planning
nature and character of a country's human resources are important
determinants of its economic structure and these clearly differ from
one region to the next.
D. Ethnicity and Religion
Ethnicity is an identity based upon a presumption of shared
history and common cultural inheritance. Ethnic identity is shaped
by both ethnic affiliation and ethnic attribution. Ethnic affiliation
refers to individuals' own sense of group membership and the
characteristics of the group as defined by its members. Ethnic
attribution concerns the characteristics of the group as defined by
outsiders.
States acted opportunistically and inconsistently in dealing with
ethnicity. Sometimes they suppressed ethnic affiliation to weaken
the resistance of subject groups to the state. At other times they
encouraged ethnic affiliation to accentuate division within the
commoner class. States also used derogatory ethnic stereotypes to
legitimize their exploitation of subject peoples. For example, Aztecs
depicted their Otomí subjects as lazy, improvident, untrained
blockheads and gaudy dressers. Stereotyping and ethnic prejudice
generally heightened ethnic consciousness and perpetuated ethnic
heterogeneity within ancient states.
The distinctive element we wish to emphasize is that of culture.
Religion is an important cultural characteristic. How important the
religious identity is varies from people to people. As we evaluate all
the various cultural characteristics, we have to determine (discover)
which of those are most determinative within the self-identity of the
particular people themselves. Different cultural characteristics are
given different relative value in each ethnic group.
Comparing religious diversity across countries presents many
challenges, starting with the definition of diversity. Social scientists
have conceived of diversity in a variety of ways, including the
degree to which a society is split into distinct groups; minority group
size (in share and/or absolute number); minority group influence
(the degree to which multiple groups are visible and influential in
civil society); and group dominance (the degree to which one or
more groups dominate society). Each of these approaches can be
applied to the study of religious diversity.
E. Industrial Structure
Classification of the three main economic activities: the
agricultural, manufacturing, and services sectors. Agriculture, both
subsistence and commercial, is the principal economic activity in
terms of the occupational distribution of the labor force, if not in
terms of proportionate contributions to the gross national product.
Farming is not merely an occupation but a way of life for most
people in Asia, Africa, and Latin America.
It is in the relative importance of both the manufacturing and
service sectors that we find the widest variation among developing
nations. Most Latin American countries, having a longer history of
independence and, in general, higher levels of national income than
African or Asian nations, possess more advanced industrial sectors
In the 1970s and 1980s, countries like Taiwan, South Korea,
Hong Kong, and Singapore greatly accelerated the growth of their
manufacturing output and are rapidly becoming industrialized
states. In terms of sheer size, India has one of the largest
manufacturing sectors in the Third World, but this sector is
nevertheless small in relation to the nation's enormous rural
population.
Third World development strategies may vary from one country
to the next, depending on the nature, structure, and degree of
interdependence among its primary, secondary, and tertiary
industrial sectors.
The primary sector consists of agriculture, forestry, and fishing;
the secondary, mostly of manufacturing; and the tertiary, of
commerce, finance, transport, and services.
F. Relative importance of the Public and Private Sectors
Most Third World countries have mixed economic systems,
featuring both public and private ownership and use of resources.
The public sector is government (national and local). Public
sector jobs include doctors, police, teachers and civil servants.
The private sector is private enterprises – retail, manufacturing,
local services. The degree of foreign ownership in the private sector
is another important variable to consider when differentiating among
LDCs.
Economic policies, such as those designed to promote more
employment, will naturally be different for countries with large public
sectors and ones with sizable private sectors.
In economies dominated by the public sector, direct government
investment projects and large rural works programs will take
precedence, whereas in private oriented economies special tax
allowances designed to induce private businesses to employ more
workers might be more common.
G. External Dependency
This approach originated in the Third World (primarily Latin
America), rather than among Western academics. Third World
dependency thinkers were concerned with explaining the unequal
and unjust situations in which they and their nations found
themselves. Third World countries were poor while "developed"
countries were rich.
Third World countries do not exist in isolation within the world
political and economic system there is a tremendous amount of
interaction among core countries and peoples, and between the
core and the periphery. Politics and economics are related.
The underdevelopment of Third World countries is directly
related to, and makes possible, the "development" of the powerful
countries of the industrialized core. So long as capitalism remains
the dominant world economic system, there is no reason for the
situation of developed and underdeveloped countries to change.
References:
 Species Diversity: Definition, Importance, Examples, Threats,
Conservation. (2021). Retrieved from
https://byjus.com/neet/why-is- species-diversity-important/
 Julian West and Padma Desai. (n.d.) Diverse Structures and
Common Characteristics of Developing Nations. Retrieved ,
from
http://www.c3l.uni-oldenburg.de/cde/OMDE625/Todaro/Todaro
%20Chapter%202.pdf
 Julian West and Padma Desai. (n.d.) Diverse Structures and
Common Characteristics of Developing Nations. Retrieved ,
from
http://www.c3l.uni-oldenburg.de/cde/OMDE625/Todaro/Todaro
%20Chapter%202.pdf
 Religion and Ethnicity. (2021). Retrieved from
http://strategyleader.org/peopledefinitions/re
Major 13: Comparative Economic Planning