Types of Developing Countries

That the developing countries are different not only because of their geographical and socio-political conditions, but also because of their level of economic growth, has been recognised at least from the time of Adam Smith. Marx gave it a central place in his socio-economic schemata of human development; he thought that his stages of tribalism, slavery, feudalism, mercantile capitalism, and industrial capitalism followed each other with something like historical necessity. In modern economic literature, it was Walter Rostow who has again brought this concept of stages of economic growth into economic thinking. His paradigm of ‘take-off’ has become a current coin of economic discussion; his characterisation of economic growth as the five successive stages of traditional society, pre-take-off stage, take-off stage, drive to maturity, and high consumption stage had a ring almost of historical inevitability.