The importance of the South

The past decade has seen a dramatic rise in the political and economic significance of some countries of the South, particularly Brazil, China, India and South Africa. Their rise is part of an ongoing but punctuated process of catch-up growth and development which began with the rapid industrialization of the first- and the second-tier East Asian economies in the 1960s and 1970s. The recent rise of countries in the South during the last decade has, by contrast been much more widespread, including in Africa, with the anticipation that new growth poles, such as Egypt and Nigeria, will continue to emerge over the coming years (O’Neill and Supnytska, 2009).

Related Subject(s): Economic and Social Development