Nation’s World Summit on the Environment in 2002). Associations to rep-
resent the rights of workers are often banned, but as inequalities increase it
is difficult to see how governments can continue to suppress legitimate
demands. While it may be good for such abstractions as growth rates and
levels of production that investment by developed countries in developing
economies, mainly Asian and Latin American, has increased, it is question-
able how good it is for the people in the low-pay occupations and ecologi-
cally vulnerable regions that make these countries attractive to foreign
investment. Economic liberalization may also be accompanied by very
limited political liberalization. The latter is of much less concern than the
former to private foreign investors. The concepts related to the theories of
dependency and neo-colonialism provide a framework for analysing the
behaviour of foreign interests within the developing and industrializing
society, their relations with indigenous interests, especially the local busi-
ness class and political élite, and the consequences of these relationships for
the urban and rural poor.
282 Understanding Third World Politics