modernization theory, major implicit or explicit tenets are that (1) societies develop through a series of evolutionary stages; (2) these stages are based on different degrees and patterns of social differentiation and reintegration of structural and cultural components that are functionally compatible for the maintenance of society; (3) contemporary developing societies are at a pre-modern stage of evolution and they eventually will achieve economic growth and will take on the social, political, and economic features of western European and North American societies which have progressed to the highest stage of social evolutionary development; (4) this modernization will result as complex Western technology is imported and traditional structural and cultural features incompatible with such development are overcome.

Dependency theory is the notion that resources flow from a periphery. of poor and underdeveloped states to a core of wealthy states, enriching the latter at the expense of the former. It is a central contention of dependency theory that poor states are impoverished and rich ones enriched by the way poor states are integrated into the world systems. the main tenet of the dependency theory is that its focused on individual nations, their role as suppliers of raw materials, cheap labor, and markets for expensive manufactured goods from industrialized countries. The unequal exchange relationship between developed and developing countries was viewed as contributing to poor economic growth