First published in 1984, this collection of twelve case studies examines the emergence of a free wage-labour force in all regions of the third world. Although the struggle and conflict through which the proletariat has achieved a degree of class consciousness is not neglected, the more dominant theme is that of the process and techniques which have created a working class on the capitalist periphery.

Capitalism and the Third World is the first comprehensive assessment of dependency and world systems scholarship, and questions whether such theories offer a scientific basis for the study of international relations. Wil Hout skilfully compares the theories of dependency and world systems with their theoretical predecessors and competitors. In the first part of the book comparisons are made with traditional economic and neo-Marxist theories of imperialism, the liberal theory of international free trade, Prebisch's structuralism and modernisation theories. The second part analyses the writings of Andre Gunder Frank, Samir Amin, Johan Galtung and Immanuel Wallerstein, and tests three causal models derived from the writings of these scholars using quantitative macro-political and macro-economic data. This valuable study will be widely used for courses on international political economy and development economics. It will be of particular interest to those studying the political economy of North-South relations.

Monograph containing essays on peasant movements, labour movements and strikes of the working class in selected developing countries - stresses the role of industrial workers in social change, and covers historical conditions of the penetration of capitalism in the third world, the situation of rural workers, attitudes towards political partys, social conflict of migrant workers and woman workers, etc. Bibliography pp. 483 to 505 and statistical tables.

The contributors to this volume suggest that the idea of a "pure" working class should be reconsidered and examine specific South Asian and Latin American case studies. A large part of the working class in the so-called third world and also in the main capitalist countries is either free (but coerced through noneconomic means) or does hidden work (e.g. as formally self-employed producers). By rethinking the fundamental assumptions of "classical" labor and working-class history, the volume contributes to the development of a noneurocentric historiography.