Mar Sean Jan Gabiosa ENGL 4 TFR 2:30-4:00

What is Neo-colonization?

Neocolonialism (also Neo-colonialism or Neo-imperialism) is the geopolitical

practice of using capitalism, business globalization, and cultural imperialism to influence
a country, in lieu of either direct military control or indirect political control, i.e.
imperialism and hegemony.

Neocolonialism is the relationship between two nations in which one exercises

strategic, economic and cultural domination, despite the legal independence of the
other.

Neocolonialism the control of less-developed countries by developed

countries through indirect means.

During the 1950s, African leaders began using a new word, neocolonialism, and
there were even books published on the subject. Neocolonialism (neo = new; thus,
“new” colonialism) refers to the idea that some countries can control their former
colonies (or other less developed countries) by political, economic and cultural
pressures.

The Africans were suggesting that European nations which were former colonial
powers in Africa were now using economic and political means to continue their
influence in their former colonies, even though these were now formally independent.

How Neocolonialism affects 21st Century?

In post-colonial studies, the term neo-colonialism describes the influence of

countries from the developed world in the respective internal affairs of the countries of
the developing world; that, despite the decolonization that occurred in the aftermath of
the Second World War (1939–45), the (former) colonial powers continue to apply
existing and past international economic arrangements with their former colony
countries, and so maintain colonial control. A neo-colonialism critique can include de
facto colonialism (imperialist or hegemonic), and an economic critique of the
disproportionate involvement of modern capitalist business in the economy of a
developing country, whereby multinational corporations continue to exploit the natural
resources of the former colony; that such economic control is inherently neo-colonial,
and thus is akin to the imperial and hegemonic varieties of colonialism practiced by the
United States and the empires of Great Britain, France, and other European countries,
from the 16th to the 20th centuries.

The world-systems theory suggests that the aftermath of colonialism and the
continuing practice of neocolonialism produces unequal economic relations within the
world system. Sociologist Immanuel Wallerstein elaborated on these forms of economic
inequality. In this theory, the world economic system is divided into a hierarchy of three
types of countries: core, semi peripheral, and peripheral. Core countries (e.g., U.S.,
Japan, Germany) are dominant capitalist countries characterized by high levels
of industrialization and urbanization. Peripheral countries (e.g., most African countries
and low income countries in South America) are dependent on core countries for
capital, and have very little industrialization and urbanization. Peripheral countries are
usually agrarian and have low literacy rates and lack Internet connection in many areas.
Semi peripheral countries (e.g., South Korea, Taiwan, Mexico, Brazil, India, Nigeria,
South Africa) are less developed than core nations but are more developed than
peripheral nations.

Neocolonialism came to be seen more generally as involving a coordinated effort

by former colonial powers and other developed countries to block growth in developing
countries and retain them as sources of cheap raw materials and cheap labor. This
effort was seen as closely associated with the Cold War and, in particular, with the U.S.
policy known as the Truman Doctrine. Under that policy the U.S. government offered
large amounts of money to any government prepared to accept U.S. protection from
communism. That enabled the United States to extend its sphere of influence and, in
some cases, to place foreign governments under its control. The United States and
other developed countries also ensured the subordination of developing countries,
critics argue, by interfering in conflicts and helping in other ways to install regimes that
were willing to act for the benefit of foreign companies and against their own country’s
interests.

More broadly, neocolonial governance is seen as operating through indirect

forms of control and, in particular, by means of the economic, financial, and trade
policies of transnational corporations and global and multilateral institutions. Critics
argue that neocolonialism operates through the investments of multinational
corporations that, while enriching a few in underdeveloped countries, keep those
countries as a whole in a situation of dependency; such investments also serve to
cultivate underdeveloped countries as reservoirs of cheap labour and raw materials.
International financial institutions such as the International Monetary Fund and
the World Bank also are often accused of participating in neocolonialism, by making
loans (as well as other forms of economic aid) that are conditional on the recipient
countries taking steps favorable to those represented by these institutions but
detrimental to their own economies. Thus, although many people see these
corporations and institutions as part of an essentially new global order, the notion of
neocolonialism sheds light on what, in this system and constellation of power,
represents continuity between the present and past.
Mar Sean Jan Gabiosa ENGL 4 TFR 2:30-4:00

Sources:
http://www.chrispforr.net/row3/americans/pdf/chapter22.pdf
https://www.boundless.com/sociology/textbooks/boundless-sociology-
textbook/global-stratification-and-inequality-8/stratification-in-the-world-
system-69/colonialism-and-neocolonialism-406-10460/
http://www.britannica.com/EBchecked/topic/408815/neocolonialism