Dependency Theory

Towards a Critique of
Developmentalist: Dependency
Theory
1960s-- United Nations Economic
Commission for Latin America.
Main Authors: Fernando H. Cardoso, Faletto,
Theotonio Dos Santos.
Main Thesis: Underdevelopment is not the
product of the persistence of “traditional”
society; instead, it is generated by the
particular fashion the expansion of capitalism
assumes in the “periphery.”
Developmentalist approaches
are wrong. The expansion of
the market does not
necessarily produce either
modernization or development.
On the contrary, capitalism
makes societies look like
“feudal” in the periphery.
 Development and
underdevelopment
constitute the two sides of
the same coin: capitalism.

The periphery is
underdeveloped because of
the development of the
center.
 Flows of Wealth

(Developed)
Center

(Underdeveloped)
Periphery
Unequal and Combined Development:
The play between Center and
Periphery reproduces in all scales
(fractal structure)

Center Periphery
Center-Periphery Center-Periphery
Center-Periphery-Center-Periphery Center-Periphery Center-Periphery
 Sovereign States

Center (Ex: England,

the U.S.)

Elites

DEPENDENT DEVELOPMENT Non-

The State and the Nation split apart sovereign
(capitalist) (popular) States
WORLD MARKET

CENTER PERIPHERY

SOCIAL EXCLUSION (POVERTY)

Against Rostow, Huntington, Moore, and...
Marx, Cardoso and Faletto argue that...

Modernization, Industrialization,
Urbanization, to Development do
not lead in the periphery. Instead,
they foster Underdevelopment, a
“caricature” of the central
societies.
For theorists of
dependency, such
as Cardoso and
Faletto...
 In the periphery, the
development of capitalism leads
to...
• Dependent and unequal development
(distorted, uneven, and pathological
form of modernization).
• Increasing dependency.
 Politically...
• (economic and social • (economic and social
integration fosters) exclusion fosters)
Democracies, extended Dictatorships (or Formal
citizenship, and the Democracies), State
rule of law, which violence, limited
PREVAIL in the Center citizenship, and the
Free market + Democracy (un)rule of law, which
PREVAIL in the
Periphery.
Alliance:
the State + Corporations
Free market + Repression
 Cardoso & Faletto:
• “The same fundamental alliance which
constitutes a dependent industrial
capitalist state may organize itself
institutionally within a context of
authoritarianism, restricted democracy,
or totalitarianism.”
SOLUTION:
BREAK UP THE
BONDS OF
DEPENDENCY
 Since
Dependency = Capitalism,

Breaking with dependency= Socialism

 Cardoso & Faletto identify three
main strategies to break the
dependency bonds
(target: the State)
1. Guerrilla movements organized against
military dictatorships (ex: Argentina 1969-
1975)
2. The Democratic Path: Salvador Allende’s
government (1970-1973)
3. Military Reformism (ex: Perú)
Importance of politics.
 C & F: “the political struggle
revolving around the state
shows what is essential in this
form of dependency: the style
of development of the
possibility of alternatives
depends upon the resolution of
this question of the state.”
 South East Asia...
• The explosive economic growth in
South East Asia at the beginning of the
1980s was considered by most
scholars the demise of the dependency
theory.
– Argument: the dependency theory cannot
explain such a process of growth.
 Wallerstein –
The World-System
• Our concepts and the units of analysis
we choose do not allow us to
understand the real organization of the
world.
• Problem: the developmentalist
perspective consecrates the nation
state as the main unit of analysis.
 Instead, from a holistic
perspective...
• The notion of “mode of production”
appears as central.
– (def.) “the way in which decisions are
made about dividing up productive
tasks, about quantities of goods to be
produced and labour-time to be
invested, about quantitites of goods to
be consumed or accumulated, about the
distribution of the goods produced.”
(345)
 Modes of Production
• “Reciprocal-lineage.”

• “World-systems”
– “World-Empire”
– -“World-Economy”
 “Reciprocal-lineage.”
• Limited and elementary specialization
of tasks and forms of exchange. Based
on human labor. Limited growth. Mini-
systems, short-lived (6 generations).
 “World-systems”1:
“World-Empire.”

– Based upon agriculture. Surplus allows

to maintain artisans and an
“administrative” class. Extra-economic
foundation (tribute, force, the power of
the sword). Technological advance is
not desirable per se. Everthing is
“fixed” in the system. Political unity of
the economy
• Interest of the powerful on the survival of
the subjected sectors.
 “World-systems”2:
“World-Economy.”

Single division of labor within a system

which “has no overarching political
structure.”

World-market, multiplicity of nation-

states. Capitalism. No limits to profit.
Starvation may be necessary for profit.
Appearance of “the poor.”
Markets became dominant in
the “World-Economy”

• System economically unified and

politically fragmented (World-market +
Nation-States).
• Different nation-states cushion and
reinforce the effects of the market.
• Importance of the role of the State...
 Critical and “dependencista”
approaches lead towards...

• An increasing focus on the role of the

State.
• Lane: “Bringing the State Back In.”