There are several ways to regionalize the geographic space, given that the regions are nothing more than the classifications observed by the human intellect on the geographic space. Thus, there are regions subjectively adopted by people in their daily lives and regions designed to based on scientific criteria, which comply with prerequisites and concepts of a natural or social order.
THE socioeconomic regionalization of the world space it is, therefore, a way of realizing a division between different countries based on the level of development in the context of contemporary capitalism. Basically, this is an update of the call "Theory of Worlds”, which regionalized the planet based on first world countries (developed capitalists), second world (planned economy or "socialist") and third world (capitalist underdeveloped). In the case of socioeconomic regionalization, only the existence of the first and third worlds is considered, given that the socialist or planned perspective is no longer open at the international level after the fall of the Wall of Berlin.
This regionalization classifies countries into two main groups: on the one hand, the countries of the developed north; on the other, the countries of undeveloped south. That's why many call this division north-south regionalization.
That said, it is considered that most of the rich countries are located in the emerging lands positioned further north of the globe, while the poor countries are mostly in the south. However, this division does not strictly follow the cartographic delimitation of the planet, with those countries central countries in the southern hemisphere, such as Australia, and peripheral countries in the northern hemisphere, such as China.
Look at the image below:
Representation of the division of countries based on socioeconomic criteria
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It is important to note that, in addition to being very comprehensive, this form of regionalization of the world geographic space has a series of limitations. The main one is that of not showing the heterogeneity that exists between countries in the same group in the classification. The countries of the developed north, for example, present themselves with the most diverse perspectives, with those considered as "powers", such as the United States, Germany and others, and those considered economically limited or suffering recent crises, such as Portugal, Greece, Russia and Italy.
Among the countries of the underdeveloped south, however, there are also clear distinctions. On the one hand, there are those countries with little or no industrialization, such as economies centered on the primary sector. basically, and, on the other hand, those so-called "emerging" or "underdeveloped industrialized" countries, such as like the BRICS (except Russia), the Asian tigers and others. Some of them, like China, have very advanced economies in terms of production and wealth generation, but they suffer from limited social conditions, poor income distribution, illiteracy, poverty and problems several.
Understanding the dynamics of world space, even from a specific perspective, is a very complicated task, so generalizations are prone to error. However, north-south regionalization is important in terms of giving us general guidance on the level of social and economic development of countries and populations in different parts of the planet. Thus, a base is built on which it is possible to deepen in terms of studies and knowledge to better characterize socio-spatial relations at the political and economic level International.
By Me. Rodolfo Alves Pena