The Dictionary of Human Geography

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Harvey (1973, 1974a) found hidden normative

claims lurking in every corner of positive theory:

in economic theories of the city, in theories of

population and resources, in quantitative

techniques. Alltheoryis normative theory.

Ourvaluesgo all the way down, and we can

no more escape them than avoid the smell of the

air we breathe (see alsoethics). tb

Suggested reading

Olsson (1978).

North^South The phrase gained in popular-

ity in the 1970s as a way to describe richer,

industrial countries on the one hand (the

North) and poorer, mainly non-industrial

countries on the other (the south). The

phrase had the advantage of moving beyond

the First, Second and Third Worlds. Although

the South clearly referred to mainly ex-colonial

or developing countries in latin america,

africaandasia, it seemed a more neutral

term than thethird world. It also spoke to

the fact that Southern countries were reorgan-

izing themselves politically in the 1970s. In

the 1950s, the Third World referred to a

group of non-aligned countries determined

to forge a new way in the global political

economy. In the 1960s, the meaning of the

Third World was changed to define a group of

countries that were marked by what was

then called underdevelopment. The idea

that these countries might have significant

geopolitical or geo-economic power was

not taken seriously. This changed, however,

when the Organization of Petroleum

Exporting Countries (OPEC) drove upoil

prices fourfold in 1973–4. The success of

this action encouraged a broader group of

developing countries, the Group of 77 –

formed in 1964 at the first UN Conference

ontradeanddevelopment– to press for a

New International Economic Order. It was

partly through the Group of 77’s demands

for fairer and more stable trading arrange-

ments, moreaid, special financial facilities

and greater voting rights in the UN that a

notion of the South was born.

In the 1980s, the Americans and other

Northern powers roundly defeated their de-

mands for a New International Economic

Order. However, a group of well-meaning

social democrats in the North did speak back

to the South’s demands through the first

and second reports of the Brandt Commis-

sion:North–South(1980) andCommon crisis

(1983). Although Brandt Commissioners

tried to direct attention to the widening (and

in their view dangerous) gaps between North-

ern and Southern countries, not much hap-

pened. Indeed, it can plausibly be argued

that the end of thecold warweakened South-

ern countries, particularly in sub-Saharan

Africa (Dodds, 1999; Fawcett and Sayigh,

2005). These countries were no longer im-

portant to either the USA or the former Soviet

Union. The irony, then, or the tragedy, is this:

in the 1970s, a map of the world that sought

to depict the global North was clumsy in

the extreme. It stretched to include mainly

temperate regions both sides of the Equator,

pulling together North America with Australia

and New Zealand. Most of the world’s land

mass, in any case, is north of the Equator. The

South mainly occupied a more discrete space

in the sub-tropical and tropical worlds. By the

end of the century the conceptual integrity

of the North seemed to make more sense,

bolstered in part by globalization. The

South, for its part, has found it increasingly

difficult to advance a coherent political posi-

tion. The Group of 77 now has 133 members,

but is largely impotent in the face of the

North’s veto on key economic and political

changes. sco

Suggested reading

Dodds (1999); Payne (2005).

nuptuality The extent of marriage (or mar-

riage rate) within a population. As research in

demographyassociated being married with

elevated fertility, delaying the age of marriage

is argued to reduce fertility, such as occurred in

some European countries in the early expand-

ing phase of thedemographic transition.

However, sensitivity to the growing diversity

of partnering and parenting arrangements in

contemporary society complicate this thesis,

and have contributed to considerable interest

in family andhouseholdorganization (e.g.

Duncan and Smith, 2002; Wright, Houston,

Ellis, Holloway and Hudson, 2003). ajb

Suggested reading

Bongaarts (1982).

Gregory / The Dictionary of Human Geography 9781405132879_4_N Final Proof page 506 31.3.2009 3:13pm Compositor Name: ARaju

NORTH–SOUTH