POLARIZATION REVERSAL IN DEVELOPING COUNTRIES

Abstract

POLARIZATION REVERSAL AND THE SPATIAL DEVELOPMENT PROCESS In a recent fugitive, though reasonably well-circulated paper [21] I coined the term polarization reversal (hereafter PR). Although this clumsy inelegant phrase is merely a new name for a well-known, if underresearched, spatial phenomenon, it seems to have fired the imagination of some observers of spatial planning in developirlg countries for it has already aroused some comment and analysis [11], [14], [15], [20]. It seems appropriate to begin a dialog with these commentators and to elaborate the significance and meaning of the concept. There are no research results presented here; the paper is intended as a stimulus to research. PR may be defined as the turning point when spatial polarization trends in the national economy give way to a process of spatial dispersion out of the core region into other regions of the system. This definition requires elaboration by placing PR in the broader context of a descriptive theory of national spatial development. The urbanindustrial process of national development begins in one or two regions only, primarily because of the scarcity of investment resources. The choice of regions is determined by initial location advantages (resource endowments, or a key immobile resource such as a port) or because it was the first area opened up from outside (and this eventually converts into the greater market size of the excolonial primate city). This initial start becomes a cumulative causation process explained by increasing returns to scale and the consequent polarization of labor and any surplus capital from other regions. The core-periphery relationship is thus established (see page 77), where the core region consisting of the primate city and its hinterland dominates the rest of the space economy, called the periphery. This periphery is dominated by the core and dependent on it, and its rate of development is controlled and distorted so as to further the core's economic interests. At a more advanced stage of development, a spatial transformation begins to occur within the core region. The population and agglomeration of economic activities in the primate city become so large that a monocentric spatial structure becomes inefficient and costly. Congestion costs and rising land values induce some economic activities to decentralize to satellite centers within the core region. These centers may intercept new migrants who are attracted by job opportunities expanding at a more rapid rate than in the primate city. But this intraregional decentralization does not count as PR, because the core region (including the primate city) continues to grow at a faster rate than the rest of the country.