Talk:Developing country

From Academic Kids

Template:Onlinesource2004

LDC, LLDC.....

the abbreviation "LDC" is used before it is defined.

It probably should be pointed out that the UN seems to use "LLDC" to mean "Land locked developing countries" [1] (http://www.un.org/issues/m-ldc.asp)

The CIA factbook does use:

LDC = less developed country & LLDC = least developed country [2] (http://www.cia.gov/cia/publications/factbook/appendix/appendix-a.html#L)

EU members?

I am pretty sure some of the eastern european nations are still developing. if i am correct, we cannot say all EU members are developed nations.

Developing nation → Developing country

and equivalently Developed nation → Developed country

The latter term is much more common (outweighs the former 10:1 in Google). Also "nation" potentially raises more political development issues than is usually intended; the term is economic. Rd232 15:02, 23 Dec 2004 (UTC)

• Support. I would assume the article was probably written by an American, since in general we Americans have little understanding of the conceptual division between a nation and state (and even less an understanding of a nation-state I might add) and have confused the terms to the point of making them synonymous when they aren't. —ExplorerCDT 15:59, 23 Dec 2004 (UTC)
• Support. Country gives a more precise meaning. Icundell 19:35, 23 Dec 2004 (UTC)
• Support as long as developing nation and developed nation remain as redirects, as they are commonly used synonyms. --LostLeviathan 00:20, 27 Dec 2004 (UTC)
• Support. -- Naive cynic 01:00, 27 Dec 2004 (UTC)
• Strong support. "Nation" is quite incorrect usage here (and taken literally, "developing nation" is quite insulting, implying lack of cultural development). —Tkinias 22:40, 27 Dec 2004 (UTC)

No it does not. To be pedantic it implies a lack of national institutions and nothing to do with culture. To take Germany as an example. It had cultural development long before it had national unity and national institutions. Indeed one could argue that for part of its existence as a nation that its cultural development went into reverse! The UK is a nation state but it consists of 3 and 1/4 countries. Just as the UK consists of more than one counrty (as did the USSR), there are countries like Korea (and before reunification Germany and Vietnam) which consists of more than one nation state. Normally when one says developing nation, one means the region inside a nation state not in the one of more (or less) countries which make up the nation state. Developing nation is usually used as a short hand for economically developing nation state. As IMF statistics are calculated by nation state and not by country, and development aid, loans etc are allocated by nation state and not by country, I am not sure why anyone would want to put the article under country. Philip Baird Shearer 15:15, 31 Dec 2004 (UTC)

"The UK is a nation state but it consists of 3 and 1/4 countries." I would say precisely the reverse is the case - the UK is a state or country consisting of English, Welsh, Scots nations, plus NI. In general, country is synonymous with state, the latter being a political term. Nation is a cultural term. We use nation state for states that consist primarily of a single nation (or perhaps claim to or aspire to). Your IMF remark, BTW, is wrong - the IMF [3] (http://www.imf.org) talks about countries, not nations or nation states. Rd232 17:21, 31 Dec 2004 (UTC)

"it means just what I choose it to mean -- neither more or less". The trouble is that the words country and nation do not have a precise meanings and vary depending on the context. England is a country and the major English national sport is football. The UK is a nation state consisting of 3 and 1/4 countries, England, Wales, Scotland and most of Ulster, which one of the four provences of Ireland (and ignoring for this example semi-detached Channel islands and the Isle of Man). One does not go to the nationside one goes to the countryside, so country has something to do with territory occupied by a people who can be identified as a nation. As for the IMF as they say On this site, the term "country" does not in all cases refer to a territorial entity that is a state as understood by international law after all it is the International Monetary Fund, it is not called the Intercountry Monetary Fund. It is the United Nations not the United Countries. Philip Baird Shearer 18:25, 31 Dec 2004 (UTC)

Look mate, by your logic, I could go on about the different meanings of "developing". Ultimately, what matters is the compound term we're describing here, and it is "developing country" by a country mile (pun intended). Rd232 21:01, 1 Jan 2005 (UTC)

I'm moving this up the page for further discussion - apart from Philip Baird Shearer there seems to be broad support, so let's have some more votes and see where it goes. Rd232 21:01, 1 Jan 2005 (UTC)

• Support. Google results can be misleading and I'm one who supports 'official' names rather than 'most commonly used' names. (And I'm sure that most Wikipedians disagree with me on this.) I support this because the IMF, UN, and WTO all use 'country' rather than 'nation'. And for those arguing over the meanings of 'country' and 'nation', my dictionary (The American Heritage Dictionary) gives this help:

Synonyms: 'Nation' primarily signifies a political body rather than a physical territory—the citizens united under one independent government, without close regard for their origins; secondarily it denotes institutional ties, a community of economic and cultural interests. 'Country', in strict usage, is a geographic term signifying the territory of one nation, but it is often used in the extended sense of 'nation'. —Mike 21:47, Jan 1, 2005 (UTC)

Trying to ascertain whether proposal does have broad consensus. Looks like to me - so can we have it moved? Rd232 00:20, 2 Jan 2005 (UTC)

It will be done as soon as an admin notices this section. Please don't move the discussion or comment elsewhere on this page. Is there some urgency with this? -- Netoholic @ 01:21, 2005 Jan 2 (UTC)