ABSTRACT
This chapter discusses how globalization impacts more developed and less developed nations differentially in economic development and income distribution. Vulnerability to economic marginality in the new international division of labour is undergoing a significant shift economically and spatially from its well-documented previous patterns. The functional integration of economic production is organized primarily by large corporations in highly developed economic regions of the North which enjoy a controlling power over peripheries of South America, Africa, portions of East and South Asia, and Oceania. The character of marginality that pertains to a specific community or territory of a given scale will depend on its political and economic history and the nature of its natural and human resources. Contingent marginality refers to unequal development caused by competitive inequality within the neo-classical economic framework. Systemic marginality refers to uneven development caused by hegemonic forces of politics and economics that produce inequities in the distribution of social, political and economic benefits.
