north-south divide

Syllable breakdown

Dictionary meaning

an idiom describing the socio-economic and political gulf between the wealthy industrialised countries of the Global North — Europe, North America, Australia, Japan — and the lower-income developing countries of the Global South — Africa, Latin America, most of Asia — reflecting historical patterns of colonial extraction, unequal terms of trade, and differential access to technology, capital, and global governance influence that have perpetuated large gaps in income, health, education, and political power between these two groups of countries; the north-south divide entered international development discourse in the 1970s through the Brandt Commission's North-South: A Programme for Survival report, which argued that global equity and mutual interest required a major redistribution of resources from rich to poor countries; while the divide has narrowed in some dimensions — with the rapid economic growth of China, India, and other emerging economies — it remains stark in many others, including access to climate finance, vaccine equity, debt sustainability, and representation in international economic governance