Patterns of Economic Geography and Development

Vocabulary practice flashcards covering classical liberalism, Fordism, spatial fixes, modernization and dependency models, neoliberalism, globalization, and economic measurement indices.

Classical Liberalism

An economic and political philosophy founded on the belief in limited government intervention, free markets, and protected individual freedoms.

Laissez-faire

A free-market principle (literally 'let it be') characterized by low government regulation, minimal state intervention in the economy, and open economic competition.

Fordism

The manufacturing system that creates standardized systems of mass production to increase productivity and lower production costs, though historically associated with repetitive labor, wage inequality, and vulnerability to boom-and-bust cycles.

Uneven Development

A systemic feature of capitalism where capital and profits accumulate in specific core regions while others remain exploited, making geographic development inherently unequal.

The Spatial Fix

The strategy by which capitalist enterprises overcome crises of accumulation by moving extraction sites, relocating production facilities to lower costs and bypass regulation, or establishing new consumer markets.

Rostow's Stages of Economic Development

A linear modernization model outlining economic progression through five successive stages: Traditional Society, Preconditions for Take-off, Take-off, Drive to Maturity, and High Mass Consumption.

Wallerstein's World System Theory Model

A dependency theory framework dividing the global economy into Core, Semi-Periphery, and Periphery, where core nations extract cheap labor and raw materials from peripheral regions while exporting high-profit consumption goods.

Transnational Corporation (TNC)

A large parent enterprise that controls and coordinates economic activities, subsidiaries, and consumer brands across multiple foreign countries.

Commodity Chain

A geographically dispersed network of labor and production operations, linking raw material processing, manufacturing factories, tiered suppliers, and international retail distribution.

Neoliberalism

An economic paradigm arguing that human well-being is best advanced by liberating individual entrepreneurial freedoms within an institutional framework characterized by strong private property rights, free markets, and free trade.

North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA)

A trilateral trade agreement implemented in 1994 designed to lower tariffs and trade barriers between the United States, Canada, and Mexico.

The Washington Consensus (1990)

A set of free-market policy reforms recommended for developing economies, centered on trade liberalization, privatization of state-owned enterprises, deregulation, and legal protection of property rights.

Structural Adjustment

Economic reform packages mandated by international lending bodies like the IMF and World Bank, granting debt relief or loans in return for privatization of public resources and reductions in state subsidies.

Economic Geography

The study of economic systems viewed as spatial networks constructed by historically situated actors, examining the spatial distribution of economic activities and uneven development.

Economic Development

The processes of change involving the nature and composition of the economy of a particular region, as defined by Knox and Marston.

Triangular Trade

A historic Atlantic commercial network from the 1600s to the 1800s involving the movement of manufactured goods from Europe to Africa, enslaved people from Africa to the Americas, and raw agricultural commodities back to Europe.

The Great Migration (1916–1930)

A major internal demographic movement in the United States in which hundreds of thousands of African Americans relocated from the rural South to industrial cities across the Northeast, Midwest, and West.

Primary Economic Activities

Sectoral economic activities directly concerned with the extraction and harvesting of natural resources, including agriculture, mining, fishing, and forestry.

Secondary Economic Activities

Sectoral economic activities that process, transform, fabricate, assemble, or package raw materials derived from primary activities into manufactured goods.

Tertiary Economic Activities

Sectoral economic activities that involve the provision, exchange, and sale of services and goods, encompassing warehousing, retail stores, hairdressing, advertising, and entertainment.

Quaternary Economic Activities

Sectoral economic activities focused on the collection, handling, and processing of knowledge and information, including data processing, education, and research and development (R&D).

Gross National Income (GNI) per Capita

A development metric measuring the total income earned by permanent residents of a country, including foreign income abroad, adjusted for domestic inflation and purchasing power parity.

Index of Commodity Concentration

A measure indicating the degree to which a country's export revenues depend upon a narrow range of raw primary products rather than a diversified economy.

Gender Inequality Index (GII)

A composite index measuring gender disparity across three fundamental dimensions—reproductive health, empowerment, and economic status—scored from $0$ (equality) to $1$ (inequality).

Gini Coefficient

A statistical measure of income or consumption inequality scored from $0$ (perfect equality, where every individual receives identical income) to $1$ (perfect inequality, where one individual receives all income).