Do you think Peru is a third world country?

[antonioz90]

Hey all,

I was having this conversation last night and I would like to hear some other opinions about this. Personally, I do not believe Peru is a third world country but a developing country. When I think of a third world nation I think of essentially no modern conveniences such as running water, electricity and sanitation coupled with a bad economy. I was comparing Peru with some countries in Africa, Asia and the Caribbean that I believe are more qualified as third world.

I know the definition of a third world country technically comes from the Cold War and that according to that historical definition Peru and other Latin countries do not align with NATO or communist countries. I think a more proper definition would include a country's economic stance and access to fulfill basic needs such as utilities and food but I would also like to hear how other people define a country as 'third world' by today's standards.

Peru is not a wealthy nation and many live in poverty without access to running water or clean conditions which can be a health hazard. However, there are some parts of the USA (where I am from) that have similar problems albeit maybe not to the same degree. I genuinely believe that when you compare Peru with other countries classified as third world it is not as bad. I am probably very naive on this topic but I am very curious as to what other people think and want to learn.

Thank you for sharing!

-Antonio

[Sergio Bernales]

In many ways, it's just semantics - (“third world” later became “developing countries” or “less developed countries”), but as the world has changed, so have many of these countries and so there are more positive connotations to the term developing country than third world. However, the problem is that it gets used as a blanket term, so it describes both fast-growing countries with dynamic economies and also very poor slow-growing countries. The article below might be helpful. I particularly liked this explanation.

"But the term third world did not originally refer to geopolitics. The first to use it in its modern sense was Alfred Sauvy, a French demographer who drew a parallel with the “third estate” (the people) during the French revolution. In 1952 Sauvy wrote that “this ignored, exploited, scorned Third World, like the Third Estate, wants to become something, too.” He was paraphrasing a remark by Emmanuel-Joseph Sieyès, a delegate to the Estates-General of 1789, who said the third estate is everything, has nothing but wants to be something. The salient feature of the third world was that it wanted economic and political clout."

http://www.economist.com/node/16329442

[danjaker]

Peru is not aligned and a partnered NATO country, therefore Peru is a third world country. Thats all.

[Sergio Bernales]

http://www.nationsonline.org/oneworld/t ... ntries.htm

[KenBE]

It all depends on your definition of "third world". Peru is (still) a somewhat poor country compared to the US or Western European countries, but compared to many countries in sub-saharan Africa or a country like Haiti it is not. Within South/Latin America Peru is somewhere in the middle (wealthier than Ecuador and Bolivia, about the same as Colombia, but poorer than countries like Chile, Argentina and Uruguay ).

http://www.taringa.net/posts/info/18493 ... -2015.html

According to this article (from 2013) Peru is the 8th wealthiest country in Latin America:
http://www.americaeconomia.com/economia ... rica-latin

[victmanu]

Peru is a poor country like Moldova or Albania or Bosnia or Ukraine or Ghana.

[Sergio Bernales]

Yes, compared to wealthier countries in Northern Europe and North America, Peru appears poor, but a comparison to very poor countries with low-growth rates, like Moldova, Ukraine, Ghana or even Albania is bit unfair. Considering current rates of GDP per head, the potential for future growth, the prospects that membership of the Pacific Alliance brings, which joins Peru's economy to the fastest growing economies in the region, recent economic stability, the outlook for the future looks reasonably good for Peru. Bloomberg expects it to be one of the ten fastest growing economies in the world this year, just ahead of Thailand and just behind Malaysia. This goes back to the OP's original question and the problems of terminology and lumping all non-G20 countries into categories such as emerging economies, or Third World. These terms don't really give a full picture of what is happening in each country.

In Peru, there is still potential for bumps in the road in the next few years, with low commodity prices, lower government revenue, the recent sluggishness in the economy and the problems in a very fractured Congress, with the President and his wife distracted by scandal, but looking at the bigger picture, the outlook for tourism and the diversification of the economy away from commodities, which membership of the Pacific alliance brings, could help maintain high growth rates. While low prices for its commodity exports are a temporary problem and its abundance of natural and cultural resources if properly managed could still yield lots of wealth. While I think that rural poverty in the Andes and improving education should be at the top of any Peruvian government's to do list, my main worry would be the environmental damage that illegal gold and silver mining in the jungle causes (not to mention the environmental and social damage wrought by cocaine production) and corruption in the provinces, but greater transparency and international involvement could hopefully help mitigate these problems. And there are already many precedents for how things can continue to get better. Even in the last ten years, there has been many improvements, but compared to the dark days of the 1980s and Alan Garcia's first presidency, Peru has come a long way - Shining path exploding bombs in Miraflores, inflation reaching 7,649% in 1990, or a cumulative total of 2,200,200% inflation of the Inti over Garcia's five-year term.

Peru has its problems like any country, perhaps worse than many Western countries, but compared to somewhere like Ukraine (about to go bankrupt and in the middle of a civil war), Moldova, the poorest country in Europe (riven by a separatist movement in Transnistria which has declared independence) and Albania, which is regarded by Transparency International as the most corrupt country in Europe, suffers from high unemployment and much of its income is from remittances from workers who have left to work overseas, things don't look too bad for Peru.

Perhaps it would be fairer to compare Peru to someone like its neighbour Colombia, or in Asia, it is expected to have similar growth rates to Malaysia (richer than Peru, but with similar growth prospects) and Thailand (which it is closer to in terms of GDP per head, poverty levels, growth prospects and demographics). In Europe, the best comparison would probably be Montenegro, which has similar levels of wealth per person. But of course, every country has problems unique to its situation and any comparison invites criticism.

GDP per person (PPP) in 2014

Peru $11,774

Bosnia Herzogovinia $9,536

Albania $9,931

Moldova $4,671

Ukraine $8,790

Ghana $3,992

http://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/ ... -this-year

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_c ... per_capita

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Transnistria

http://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-17679574

http://www.bbc.com/news/world-latin-america-19928905

Nominal GDP per head paints a slightly different picture, but is still worth a look.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_c ... per_capita