Third World, general designation of developing nations. The term arose during the Cold War, when two opposing blocs—-one led by the United States (the First World), the other led by the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics (the Second World)—appeared to dominate world politics. Within this bipolar model, the Third World consisted of economically and technologically less developed countries belonging to neither bloc, most of which had experienced colonialism. Originated by the Martinique-born Marxist writer Frantz Fanon, the designation was essentially negative and not always accepted by the countries concerned. Although political and economic upheavals in the late 1980s and early 1990s marked the collapse of the Soviet power bloc, “Third World” remains a useful label for a conglomeration of countries otherwise difficult to categorize.

The countries of the Third World, containing some two thirds of the world’s population, are located in Latin America, Africa, the Middle East, and Asia. Politically, they are generally non-aligned nations. Some are moving out of their previous situation and are on the verge of joining the ranks of industrialized countries. Others, with poor economies facing particularly acute difficulties in development, are at times lumped together as forming a “fourth world”.

Political instability caused by precarious economic situations is widespread in the Third World. Democracy in the Western meaning of the term is frequently absent. The countries concerned have commonly preferred to create their own institutions based on indigenous traditions, needs, and aspirations. It is debated whether China is part of the Third World, with which it once identified itself on racial, cultural, and developmental grounds, proclaiming that the exploited countries should unite against imperialist forces, both Western and Soviet. After the death of Mao Zedong in 1976, however, the Chinese attitude moderated.

The Third World displays little homogeneity; it is divided by race, religion, culture, and geography, as well as frequently opposite interests. It generally sees world politics in terms of a global struggle between rich and poor countries—the industrialized North against the disadvantaged South. Some nations, such as those of the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC), have found ways to assert their economic importance as sources of raw materials indispensable to industrial economies, and others may try to follow suit. Widely advocated within the Third World used to be the so-called New International Economic Order, which through a combination of aid and trade agreements would transfer wealth from the developed to the developing nations. However, modern development economics has highlighted the extent to which private investment and reform to create free market economies has helped some Third World countries, while standards of living in others plummet. These and other economic disparities, as well as the end of the old geopolitical blocs, is beginning to break open the old framework of Third World alliances and attitudes—without, however, helping the plight of the poorest countries. The New International Economic Order now looks impossible, and only internal political and institutional reform has arisen to replace it as a source of hope.