domestic economy. Third World states had shown themselves capable of
taking controlling action against foreign firms located in their territories, such
as nationalization, the acquisition of majority shareholdings, joint ventures
and service contracts. Independence provided opportunities for the national
bourgeoisie, liberal reformers, democratic socialists, communists or military
populists to alter relationships with rich countries. Independent governments
could enter into alliances and trade agreements that were not open to them
before, strengthening their bargaining positions in international economic
relations (Cohen, B. J., 1973, p. 221). The bargaining power of newly inde-
pendent countries was further increased by collective organizations such as
OPEC and the Andean Pact.
Some newly industrialized countries (NICs) show how significant the
state can be in autonomous national economic development and how signif-
icant the national bourgeoisie can be in using that state apparatus in order to
promote high rates of growth along capitalist lines. The NICs have been
classified among the most dirigisteregimes with state intervention at all
levels in support of private capital. They are among the most planned and
some would say corporatist economies. In supporting private capital the
state has interfered with the free operation of market forces by the suppres-
sion of organized labour, the lowering of wages, and the weakening of polit-
ical opposition to government policies. Foreign investment has been
welcomed. Protected enclaves have been provided, such as free trade zones
for high growth activities in which enterprises qualify for tax relief and
enjoy a docile labour force, and where import tariffs and export licences are
easily available. All this has been provided on behalf of what appears to be
a dominant property-owning class. There is not much sign of the disarticu-
lation to which the dependency theorists attached so much importance.
So the NICs require us to think again about the dependency framework.
Their recent histories strongly suggest that not everything is determined by
the international division of labour, and that political leaders can exploit,
within limits, commercial links (to diversify trade), domestic assets (or even
liabilities, such as debt), and a range of external sources of aid and loans
(Seers, 1981).
Independence also encouraged the development of social movements
which gave added momentum to economic development. New ruling
groups, often petty-bourgeois in nature, could mobilize themselves. The
absence of a fully formed national bourgeoisie has been compensated for by
a state apparatus which has assumed the role of a bourgeois ruling class.
So Third World societies had acquired their own indigenous ruling class,
not in the form of a private property-owning bourgeoisie but in the form of
Neo-colonialism and Dependency 101