Following the World War II, the world was theoretically seperated into two ideological camps named as the Western Bloc led by the United States of America (US) and the Eastern Bloc led by the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics (USSR). However, another classification in terms of their economic development divided the countries in the world into three groups: First World (Developed Western countries), Second World (Communist countries), Third World.
Within this context and under the shade of the harsh rivalry between the US and the USSR, it had become extremely important that which ideological camp the Third World countries would choose to be associated with.

While the vertical division line of the iron curtain symbolized the ideological differences between the West and the East, the horizontal division line
between the North and the South symbolized the differences in the level of development.