why do we say 'the third world' what happended to the second?

Answer 1

I do believe it's not called "Third World" anymore....it's "Developing Countries"

Answer 2

The "Old World" refers to Europe and some parts of western Asia. The "New World" is mostly North America. The "Third World" generally refers to those countries which are less developed socially/economically.

Answer 3

Originally the idea of dividing the world into 3 areas 1st, 2nd and 3rd world comes from a sociological theory. The original names being ‘core’, ‘semi-periphery’ and ‘periphery’.
The theory itself talks about the economical and political relationship between the 3 groups. If you want to know about it in more details you should read some of Immanuel Wallerstein’s publications. The theory does not specifically state which countries fall under what label.
Furthermore I would argue that the theory is to simplistic to use in today’s world and being taken out of context from the original cannot be used.
Today saying first world and second world countries simply means rich and poor. Second world countries are no longer referred to simply because one would have to go back to the theory to try to classify different regions.

Answer 4

THIRD WORLD, the economically underdeveloped countries of Asia, Africa, Oceania, and Latin America, considered as an entity with common characteristics, such as poverty, high birthrates, and economic dependence on the advanced countries. The French demographer Alfred Sauvy coined the expression ("tiers monde" in French) in 1952 by analogy with the "third estate," the commoners of France before and during the French Revolution-as opposed to priests and nobles, comprising the first and second estates respectively. Like the third estate, wrote Sauvy, the third world is nothing, and it "wants to be something." The term therefore implies that the third world is exploited, much as the third estate was exploited, and that, like the third estate its destiny is a revolutionary one. It conveys as well a second idea, also discussed by Sauvy, that of non-alignment, for the third world belongs neither to the industrialized capitalist world nor to the industrialized Communist bloc. The expression third world was used at the 1955 conference of Afro-Asian countries held in Bandung, Indonesia. In 1956 a group of social scientists associated with Sauvy's National Institute of Demographic Studies, in Paris, published a book called Le Tiers-Monde. Three years later, the French economist Francois Perroux launched a new journal, on problems of underdevelopment, with the same title. By the end of the 1950's the term was frequently employed in the French media to refer to the underdeveloped countries of Asia, Africa, Oceania, and Latin America.




http://webclass.lakeland.cc.il.us/his153/new_page_13.htm
go to this website and it will tell you all about it.

Answer 5

The term derives form the progression form the Old World - the Mediterranean countries; the New World - the Americas and Australia and then the third World - everywhere else.

Answer 6

"The subjective terms First World, Second World, and Third World, can be used to divide the nations of Earth into three broad categories. The term "Second World" has largely fallen out of use because the circumstances to which it referred largely ended with the 1991 collapse of the Soviet Union, and also because the popularity of its sister phrase "Third World" has divided the world between rich and poor in many people's minds."

Answer 7

Europe is the first world, along with Asia developed.
North America is the second world along with developed South America.
Third world countries are waiting to go through the industrial revelution, or the techno revolution, or the information revolution.
Our Western culture isn't even post modern, we have moved into a new age and the only name I have found for it is the Age of Aquarious.

Answer 8

I asked this a few weeks ago- this is what I learnt:
First World- UK, America etc
Second World- Russia and surrounding areas
Third World- Africa etc ( basically countries that did not get involved in the cold war)
If this is wrong I am sorry- it's what I was told!

Answer 9

The second world is Russia, Eastern Europe, some of the Turk States, and China.

Have a map: http://nationsonline.org/bilder/third_world_map.jpg

Answer 10

I think the description 'second world' refer to countries which are economically below places such as the USA , UK, Canada, France, etc., but above truly economically depressesed countries such as Sudan, Somalia, etc.., where the per capita income is so low that it hardly registers. Hence Russia and many of its former satellites would be 'second world' using this economic criterion.