Is Thailand A 3rd World Country Still?

Plus · February 10, 2006

What's the purpose of discussing this? People refer to Thailand as a 3rd world country when they want to make a point about her backwardness. No one ever objects.

What's the point in classifying Thailand farther? What for? IMF or ADB might want it to determine Thailand's credit rating but I don't see any point here, on TV forum.

zzap · February 10, 2006

Well, I'd like to know the status of the country I live in, something a bit more meaningful than "3rd world".

Anything wrong with this?

steveromagnino · February 10, 2006

What's the purpose of discussing this? People refer to Thailand as a 3rd world country when they want to make a point about her backwardness. No one ever objects.
What's the point in classifying Thailand farther? What for? IMF or ADB might want it to determine Thailand's credit rating but I don't see any point here, on TV forum.

1. Because 3rd world means not part of the west, or the communist band; with regards to backwardness other than to comment mistakenly about Thailand economically and match it alongside Cambodia and Laos as a 3rd world country is not very accurate, and if someone was to do so around me then I would try to explain to them why this might not be the case, and ask for clarification about what they meant by 3rd world, since to me it is no longer a particularly useful concept with the fall of communism. So in answer to your comment, well I object to Thailand being referred to as a 3rd world country with regards to backwardness. That would like saying USA is a licencious country, with regards to the country seeming to have a lot of people with driving licenses

2. We like to have seemingly pointless conversations here, so this seems as good as any. With the introduction of concepts like the 4th world and statements of conviction regarding Thailand's place, it seems a great place to learn from others where Thailand stands. If you don't feel this is interesting, I am sure you can find many other threads on football, bank fraud and breast augmentation that may be more to your tastes

thedude · February 10, 2006

BAF ,

What about asian countries like South Korea and Singapore, or for that matter Taiwan? Will their "cultures" stand in the way of them being 1st world countries? How much development is necessary for a developing country to be a developed country? What are the objective criteria for first worldom?

steveromagnino · February 10, 2006

BAF ,
What about asian countries like South Korea and Singapore, or for that matter Taiwan? Will their "cultures" stand in the way of them being 1st world countries? How much development is necessary for a developing country to be a developed country? What are the objective criteria for first worldom?

I'd be fascinated to the answer for this one, especially given that when we compare GDP per capita which is as good a measure as any - ranked in order from top to bottom, let's see how the Asian countries stack up against smoe of the western superior culture countries (I won't list all, just note the interesting ones)

USA 4th $42k

Hong Kong 8th $37k

Australia 18th $32k

UK 20th $31k

Japan 22nd $30k

Germany 25th $30k

Singapore 26th $30k

UAE 29th $29k

EU overall 31st $28k

Taiwan 36th $27k

Spain 38th $25k

Greece 43rd $23k

South Korea 51st $20k

Portugal 57th 18k

Malaysia 83rd $10k

Thailand 97th $8k

Philipines 132nd $5k

Now...what i find interesting, of course other than the fact that Singapore, Korea, Taiwan, HK are all up there along with a few other countries like UAE that are not first world above a few of teh western countries and certainly not far off the EU stats....is that the most western country (because perhaps Singapore and HK are so small as to not be that relevant and both have a few factors of particular note) within Asia is probably Philipines.

Occupied by Spain then America for what, 300 years. Fluent english speaking. Catholic. The USA was even kind enough to select who should run the country for a while..... and look at where this country, which has probably the most western culture in many ways of the Asian countries, is ranking in terms of GDP per capita. So... after 300 years of teaching the people of the Philipines the ways of the superior culture...well they must not have learned it very well

Of course there are more factors than just GDP or GNP per capita.... but I am curious to know what they are?

PeaceBlondie · February 10, 2006

I stand corrected. My highly proclaimed BRITISH dictionary from 2002 says this about 'third world.' First of all, the term is OFFENSIVE. Second, it now denotes poor countries, which don't have much development. Finally, "People now prefer to use the term, 'developing countries.'"

So, the term has changed from one that was initially political alignment, and then (perhaps since 1991) has come to have a pejorative, offensive denotation based on poverty and lack of development.

We're just arguing semantics, not Thailand, so can we please move this thread to www.franticsemanticantics.com ?

Jaffy · February 10, 2006

I stand corrected. My highly proclaimed BRITISH dictionary from 2002 says this about 'third world.' First of all, the term is OFFENSIVE. Second, it now denotes poor countries, which don't have much development. Finally, "People now prefer to use the term, 'developing countries.'"
So, the term has changed from one that was initially political alignment, and then (perhaps since 1991) has come to have a pejorative, offensive denotation based on poverty and lack of development.

We're just arguing semantics, not Thailand, so can we please move this thread to www.franticsemanticantics.com ?

At last an intelligent response!

Jack Jones · February 10, 2006

Well, I'd like to know the status of the country I live in, something a bit more meaningful than "3rd world".
Anything wrong with this?

Nothing wrong with asking but take a look around, you're in the best place to judge. Is employment geared towards development, are support and services moving towards standards expected in Western countries etc.

IMO - Thailand is developing

zzap · February 10, 2006

There are reasons many of us stay in Thailand rather than Laos or Cambodia, a major underlying reason is the status of 'development'.

How would you distinguish Cambodia and Laos from Thailand?

Thailand is a developing country at the edge of industrialisation, which is reflected in the standard of living, the quality of services etc., whereas Cam and Laos are 'less developed'.

Anything objectionable to this terminology? Is this "evil PC"?

Prakanong2005 · February 10, 2006

When i studied Economics ans Economic history at University it always went like this

1st World - the industrialised nations with a capitalist economic system

2nd World - the county's with a socialist/communist economic system ie the Soviet Block and it allies etc

3rd World - a bit like Nehru's definition - those non-industrialised economically undeveloped nations

NIC - is the term often used in Thailand pre-97 crash

I would say its straddling the definitions as geographically internally there is a lot of differential develpment ie industrialised central Thailand and eastern seaboard then rural subsistance economy for much of the NE and north etc

jackr · February 10, 2006

If a country cannot sort out the ring road of it's second city (CM) within 2 years then it is third world

Brainwashing the kids in school and brainwashing the masses with Thai TV does not bode well for the future.

Then again, I'd much rather live in the 3rd world with all it's faults and be happy than be stuck in the pc west where conformity rules and you can't drive down the road with the dog and helmet in the basket for a som tam and a beer.

wolf5370 · February 10, 2006

Nope, sorry, you are ALL wrong...

I clearly remember Thaksin telling us that LoS would be 1st world within 6 months and that was, what, two years ago (?). So, it MUST be first world now then. Must'nt it?

BAF · February 10, 2006

A lot of Eastern European countries aren't first world... unless you conveniently forget about them to support your argument.

I haven't forgot them, it's just that you have apparently not read or not understood what I have written (twice) about them:

"[...] the 2nd world was made up of the communist countries and is today made up of those same countries but with some of the now ex-communist countries sliding outside the "2nd world" category towards the 3rd world and some towards the 1st (the latter mostly impeded by socio-political considerations rather than by economical ones)."

Belfastboy · February 10, 2006

is this tpic starting to bore just me? zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz

i think most opinion wud agree that thailand is a developing country...and that iwud figure somewhere in the middle of that assessment... ie there are different levels of development...

eg..malayasia is developing country, but wud be regarded as top of that group.

THE END....LOL.. ...in my opinion of course.

PS..its a 3rd world country no matter how it is packaged.

mittheimp · February 10, 2006

As a one time geography teacher I can tell you that the terms 'Third world' as well as 'first' and 'second' are no longer used in secondary schools (in the UK), i suppose as they somehow suggest a ranking of importance. Now the terms MEDC and LEDC are used - more/less economically developed countries. Thailand clearly is a LEDC, all be it one that is at a higher stage of development than most. A lot of the former 'second world' would also find themselves classified as LEDC countries. Some countries are hard to rank - Poland, South Africa, Malaysia, Brazil are examples from different continents. GDP, infant mortality, debt, literacy, life expectancy and infrastructure are some of the factors used to indicate the stage of a countries development.

Walk around parts of Bangkok and it is as developed as anywhere in the world, i lived in south Wales for a bit and that was truly the most depressing and poverty stricken place I have spent time in, and Aborigines living in and around the town of Katherine in the Northern territory have a lower life expectancy than the average Cambodian - - so the terms are used as general indicators for a nation as a whole as everywhere has anomalies and pockets of prosperity and deprivation. It should also be remembered that the terms are really only designed to help explain global economic development patterns and not actual 'clubs' that require membership.

BAF · February 10, 2006

Also, there is nothing "PC" about the term "Developing Country",

There isn't anything PC in the expression itself, the PCness is in the fact that it's being used to avoid using the original expression "3rd world" because it has somehow "developed" an almost insulting (!) connotation to PC eyes.

It's the same story with everything else with the PC brigade.

In itself what has the noun "negro" of insulting? It was initially the perfectly normal word to indicate dark skinned Africans. Then it was "deemed" insulting(!) and it was "black", then the story repeated and it has to be "person of color"... and so on and on...

And don't think that it happens only in the English language. It's the same everywhere in the West (because the PCness is the same).

In my own mother tongue (Italian), and using the same example as before it was "negro", than "nero" (which means black), then "persona di colore" (which means person of color).

Even "developing country" and "less developed country" are (misteriously) growing an insulting connotation so yet other expressions are being used nowadays...

it is simply more accurate and less confusing, just note that nobody argues what a Developing Country is, but some, like yourself, BAF, have made lengthy, yet still unsatisfying attempts to give the term "3rd World" a definition.

I haven't attempted to give the expression "3rd World" a definition at all

I have written that "3rd World" is a category part of a complex and blurred socio-economical-political definition and I have then just completed the list of the other remaining categories.

BAF · February 10, 2006

Since there are now definitions of 1st, 2nd 3rd and now 4th world, can we get a clear definition of each in non political terms, so then we can debate where Thailand fits; preferably using UN, IMF, World Bank or CIA references if they use this definitation system (which I understand they do not).

"In non political terms"? It IS a (socio-economical-)POLITICAL definition

UN, IMF etc indicators are all to be used as well since they all are part of the complex definition of a country's development stage.

BAF
Regarding Japan, you comment that 'History teaches us that what prevents 3rd world countries to become 1st world is, most and foremost, their 3rd world cultures.' and you go on to say 'Japan has made it to 1st world status and look at how socio-economical-politically different it is from all the rest of the Asian societies.'

Obviously, it was very different socially to other Asian countries anyway, since each country in this part of the world at least tends to be somewhat varied.

Of course, but my point is that it is NOW much more socio-economical-politically different from the rest of Asia than it was BEFORE.

However, I am very curious to understand what cultural elements Japan gave up in order for them to become 1st world?

I wouldn't say "given up" and I have, in fact, written "[...]mixed in such a short time with their local flavour of typical Asian values and principles[...]"

It surely cannot be business practices, since the quality and innovation aspects of most of the way they do things is emulated in the west rather than a copy of the west (e.g. Toyota manufacturing is the benchmark for Boeing, they've left most of the American car manufacturers behind);

You have a very short historic memory

Japan has been in its relatively recent past not much different from what China is today (RE "the quality and innovation aspects of most of the way they do things").

It cannot be the culture of the people, since so much of Japan is still very different, at least from what I can see, to this more developed west you speak of.

And in fact I said "mixed" and not "substituted".

Certain aspects of today's Japan aren't much different from what they were before and from what the rest of Asia has always been. For example, look at their laws RE citizenship...

I can think of several reasons for Japan's emergence, and there are other parts of Asia that are emulating that success in certain industries; would you also propose that each of these areas is also in some way giving up their '3rd world culture' and if so, which parts?

They aren't "giving up" anything, they are DEVELOPING.

You think our own today's culture is what it was 100 or 200 years ago?

You think our culture of the time is compatible with how we run things today?

They (non Westerners) are all to various degrees resisting the change because the path their cultures have been following is much different from our's and would lead them in a (sometime much) different direction than where the West is headed today so adjusting the direction and the pace takes them much more effort than it takes us to simply "naturally" follow our "nature".

Some cultures are more willing (and adept) to change and compromise, some others not.

That's (also) why you see different degrees of development and different paces of growth.

Some cultures don't deem desiderable to follow us at all and they are following their own path, some others just want our wealth and nothing else and they are not getting it because, simply, their way of doing things don't lead to wealth.

I am further curious as to what you define as 'western' because there are a lot of countries in the world.

Western Europe, North America, Australia and New Zealand. In other words, the Western Europe and the countries whose today societies are prevalently of European heritage and share a largely common set of values and principles. (you may want to call it "farangland" )

And like all the other definitions and concepts expressed here, it's not "my definition".

I am most curious as to what these 'Western culture and principles' that 'form the only way to development' are. [...] Some are made up of immigrants, and many of these countries owe much of their success to the rape and pillage of other countries. I was not aware that this was exclusive to the 'west' but is this one of the only ways to development of which you speak?
China is doing a fine job in Tibet, ah, perhaps this is indeed why their economy is going to overtake the west within my lifetime most likely.

Sorry but you are mixing up so many different issues and I don't want to open other cans of worms than the ones already opened

This kind of stuff is part of what I have been studying in a past life and whenever I get into this kind of discussion I usually get banned because most people can't stand honest and solidly argued truths

BAF · February 10, 2006

BAF ,
What about asian countries like South Korea and Singapore, or for that matter Taiwan? Will their "cultures" stand in the way of them being 1st world countries? How much development is necessary for a developing country to be a developed country? What are the objective criteria for first worldom?

They are NICs but they are not first world essentially for socio-political reasons.

"Developing countries" isn't meant as just "economically developing countries", remember we are talking about socio-economical-political definitions. NIC is one as well.

shasta · February 11, 2006

BAF ,

What about asian countries like South Korea and Singapore, or for that matter Taiwan? Will their "cultures" stand in the way of them being 1st world countries? How much development is necessary for a developing country to be a developed country? What are the objective criteria for first worldom?

They are NICs but they are not first world essentially for socio-political reasons.

"Developing countries" isn't meant as just "economically developing countries", remember we are talking about socio-economical-political definitions. NIC is one as well.

What about Israel?

First? not a member of NATO