The aim of this study is to show that there is a basic difference between the model of the accumulation of capital and economic and social development that is char­acteristic of an autocentric system and that of a system in the periphery.

This dif­ference—that we consider to be absolutely fundamental—having been highlighted, it is in the general theoretical framework that we shall try to relocate questions of social structure as well as the diverse aspects that are essential to the problems of the contemporary world, both social (particularly that of unemployment, under-employ­ment and marginalization) as well as ideological and political (especially problems of social consciousness, class consciousness, problems of planning, the mobilization of resources and people, problems of education and its social role etc.).

The diagram below ‘sums up’ abstractly the difference—from this viewpoint— between an autocentric system and a peripheral one:

The economic system is divided into four sectors that can be considered either from the production angle or from that of the distribution of the active population involved in the production activities as described.

This text was first published in Samir Amin: Imperialisme et Sous Developpement en Afrique (Paris: Editions Anthropos 1988).

S. Amin, Samir Amin, SpringerBriefs on Pioneers in Science and Practice 16, 23

DOI: 10.1007/978-3-319-01116-5_3, © The Author(s) 2014

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