The definition of “golden billion” has become quite popular in Russian journalism. What does this concept include? The Free Russian Encyclopedia "Tradition" defines the "golden billion" as a metaphor describing the difference in the standard of living between the population of highly developed countries and the rest of the world.
Where did the expression "golden billion" come from?
The authorship of this expression is unknown. Some researchers attribute the expression "golden billion" to Paul Ehrlich. Massively, this expression has been used since about 2000. Popularized the expression of S. G. Kara-Murza is a scientist, political scientist and publicist.
"Golden Billion" - the total population of developed countries: USA, Canada, Australia, EU countries, Japan, Israel and South Korea.
The expression is based on ideas about the progress and prosperity of a small number of people on the planet, since the natural resources of the Earth are very limited.
Prerequisites for the emergence of the term "golden billion"
The idea that there will not be enough natural resources for everyone first appeared in 1798, in the works of T. Malthus, an English demographer and economist. Thomas Malthus in his book "An Essay on the Law of Population" predicted a global catastrophe, since according to his theory, the population is growing faster than the production of resources. Malthus's theory was that the smaller the population of the Earth, the greater the average per capita income.
But T. Malthus could not foresee the industrialization of the 20th century. It was in this century that there was a sharp jump in productivity in agriculture and industry, new types of materials and raw materials were obtained. In many industries, natural raw materials have been replaced with artificial materials. Extraction of minerals has increased.
Conspiracy theory
In a number of economically developed countries, ideas of manipulating public consciousness are widespread. These ideas are that there should be a steady increase in welfare in these countries. For countries with developing economies, it is necessary to create obstacles to independent development and existence.
Some authors believe that the term "golden billion" hides a whole geopolitical and economic system - countries with a high standard of living should by all possible measures (political, economic, military) keep other states as suppliers of natural resources and cheap labor.
The main essence of the concept is to create a single world government that will be able to redistribute natural resources at the disposal of twenty highly developed countries.
From this system, the concept of "globalization" has grown - the process of influencing various factors of international importance: economic and political relations of individual countries, their cultural and informational interaction. The concept of "globalization" is based on the theory that the development of financial institutions should not be limited by geographic boundaries, that is, the internal economy of any state should be dependent on financial supranational structures.
