The fluid character of that order is a major reason why recent administrations in Washington have had such difficulties articulating a U.S. policy vision. At the height of the Cold War, there was a generally industrialized and free First World, a communist Second World, and an underdeveloped, largely non-aligned Third World. By the late 1980s, these divisions were beginning to erode, as some communist lands began to develop freer institutions and some underdeveloped nations evolved into industrial democracies. The emerging order also involves a division of the world into three parts. Those parts, however, differ from the three Cold War worlds in important ways.
Ideology is no longer the basis of the division.
The non-aligned states are no longer an important category. Some countries of the Third World have become prosperous market democracies, such as South Korea and Chile. Many states in this category run the risk of backsliding into political chaos and economic decline. It is not clear if this will be a purely transitional category, or if some of these states will establish enduring systems marked by authoritarian politics, heavily politicized economies, and relatively low levels of prosperity. It is clear that the future of the transitional states will be one of the most important determinants of the new system.