Primary Source Exercises

P. T. Bauer, "Western Guilt and Third World Poverty"
http://www.valt.helsinki.fi/atk/gpe/texts/bauer.htm

Read and critically analyze these two documents using the Guidelines for Historical Documentation (22.0K)

Consider the following claims with respect to the argument presented by the author. In what ways can these claims be seen as correct or incorrect?

1		The "poorest and most backward countries" were largely Western colonies and did have external economic contacts through the process of colonization.
2		The argument that "market forces… [are] not prescribed by the West" is fallacious. The economies of the Western nations drive the world economy.
3		Contact with the West has brought no material progress to the Third World: what progress westerners did bring during the era of colonialism left with them as decolonization occurred.
4		External commercial relations do not provide new ideas, methods, and crops; they turn the Third World into a cheap labor force for the First World, a status they can never hope to escape.
5		Third World countries and their leaders have been molded more by the West than by the traditions of their ancestors.