--One of the last books authored by the world renowned theorist. --Wallerstein's core text is supplemented by critique and commentary by 5 important intellectuals. --Sets the position of the global left today in a long historical frame

--One of the last books authored by the world renowned theorist. --Wallerstein's core text is supplemented by critique and commentary by 5 important intellectuals. --Sets the position of the global left today in a long historical frame

The dominant view in social science has been that the modern world shows a pattern of linear development in which all positive social trends rise (albeit at an uncertain speed) toward a relatively homogenized world. In the post-1945 period, some analysts contested this linear model, arguing that the modern world was rather one of escalating polarization. Their view was strengthened by the separate emergence within the natural sciences of complexity studies, which suggested that natural systems inevitably moved away from equilibrium, and at a certain point bifurcated radically. This book, based on a truly collaborative international research project, evaluates the empirical evidence in this debate in order to (1) give an adequate portrayal of the historical realities of the world-system, (2) draw a nuanced assessment about this debate, and (3) provide the basis on which we can not only envisage probable future trends but also draw conclusions about the policy and/or political implications of past and future research. The work of ten research clusters, based on crucial topics of overlapping nodes of social activity, provides a vantage-point with which to assess the basic issue; a clear picture emerges of "world-historical interpretations of continuing polarizations."

This book examines the changing nature of global inequalities and efforts that are being made to move toward a more egalitarian world society. The contributors are world historical sociologists and geographers who place the contemporary issues of unequal power, wealth and income in a global historical perspective. The geographers examine the roles of geopolitics and patterns of warfare in the historical development of the modern world-system, and the sociologists examine endeavours to improve the situations of poor peoples and nations and to engage the challenges of sustainability that are linked with global inequalities. Overcoming Global Inequalities contains cutting-edge research from engaged social scientists intended to help humanity deal with the challenges of global inequality in the 21st century.

Uncertain Worlds is the definitive presentation of the evolution of world-systems analysis from the point of view of its founder, Immanuel Wallerstein. Few theorists have offered a more systematic theory of what has become known as 'globalisation' than Wallerstein. The book includes a one-of-kind interview with Wallerstein by Carlos Rojas, a conversation between Wallerstein and Lemert about the history of the field as it has come down to the present time, a long essay by Lemert on the uncertainties of the modern world-system, as well as a preface by Rojas and a concluding essay by Wallerstein. No other book lends such biographical, historical, and personal nuance to the biography of world-systems analysis and, thus, to the history of our times. The will be a key reference book for students of global politics, economics and international relations.

This volume is part of the "Worldviews, Science and Us" series of proceedings and contains several contributions on the subject of worlds, cultures and society. It represents the proceedings of several workshops and discussion panels organized by the Leo Apostel Center for Interdisciplinary studies within the framework of the "Research on the Construction of Integrating Worldviews" research community set up by the Flanders Fund for Scientific Research, over the period of time between 2005 to 2010. Further information about this research community and a full list of the associated international research centers can be found at http://www.vub.ac.be/CLEA/res/worldviews/

Describes the evolution of the structures of cognition and intentionality over the longue-duree of historical capitalism. This the first book to analyze this socio-cultural sphere using this approach. It is timely, given the contemporary period of educational crisis, and ideal for students of Sociology. This book tells the story of how the very idea of two cultures - the so-called divorce between science and the humanities - was a creation of the modern world-system. The contributors, working from a common research framework, trace the divorce of facts and values - indivisible within medieval Europe's structures of knowledge - as part of the transition from feudalism to capitalism. This led to a polarization between universalist science (destined to become dominant as the empirical mode of arriving at truth) and the particularist humanities (defending its legitimacy as an alternative, more empathetic mode of knowing) and finally to the creation of the social sciences as an uneasy intermediary in this epistemological debate. the two cultures that emerge from science, feminism, race and ethnic studies, cultural studies, and ecology, ending with an analysis of the culture wars and the science wars.

In this book prominent scholars from around the world debate two major themes: the past and future of the capitalist world-economy, and the ways in which a capitalist economy shapes Western research, the academy, and broader knowledge structures. Putting the two themes together, they also analyze the relationship between scholarship and the rest of the world. The book is published to commemorate the 25th anniversary of the Fernand Braudel Center. Contributors Samir Amin, Christopher Chase-Dunn, Bart Tromp,. Claudia von Werlhof, Giovanni Arrighi, Pablo Gonzalez-Casanova, Marcel van der Linden, Randall Collins, Mahm ood Mamdani, Boaventura de Sousa Santos, Michel-Rolph Trouillot, Janet Abu-Lughod, Maurice Aymard, and Immanuel Wallerstein.

This book tells the story of how the very idea of two cultures-the so-called divorce between science and the humanities-was a creation of the modern world-system. The contributors, working from a common research framework, trace the divorce of "facts" and "values" as part of the transition from feudalism to capitalism. This led to a polarization between universalist "science" and the particularist "humanities" and finally to the creation of the social sciences as an uneasy intermediary in this epistemological debate. The book addresses the contemporary attempts to overcome the division between the two cultures that emerge from science, feminism, race and ethnic studies, cultural studies, and ecology, ending with an analysis of the culture wars and the science wars. Contributors: Volkan Aytar, Ay,se Betul Celik, Mauro Di Meglio, Mark Frezzo, Ho-fung Hung, Biray Kolloupglu K3/4rl3/4, Agustin Lao- Montes, Eric Mielants, Boris Stremlin, Sunaryo, Norihisa Yamashita, Deniz Yukeseker.

Immanuel Wallerstein draws on a lifetime of study of long-term historical change to shed light in his newest book on the consequences of the recent, significant turn in U.S. foreign and economic policies. Alternatives shows how the U.S. has been in decline since the 1970s and how these longer trends dovetail with current Bush administration policies, which he describes as an attempt to reverse the decline in ways that are disastrous to the future of the country and the world. The book's middle section is a log of insightful commentaries written between 2001 and 2004 detailing how the Bush administration has broken the pattern of foreign policies set by six presidents from Richard Nixon to Bill Clinton. Wallerstein suggests that a threshold has been crossed that will make it difficult for future presidents to practice the kind of 'soft' multilateralism in foreign policy they have used in the past and maintain effective alliances. He also shows, surprisingly, why 'globalization' already is dead, especially in terms of the United States' ability to dominate economically in the manner that it has since WWII. He calls for a major revision of U.S. policies, and not an attempt merely to return to the pre-Bush foreign policy. In conclusion, Wallerstein's visionary book speaks to the challenges the U.S. must face if it is to play a meaningful and progressive role in the world-system.

In this book prominent scholars from around the world debate two major themes: the past and future of the capitalist world-economy, and the ways in which a capitalist economy shapes Western research, the academy, and broader knowledge structures. Putting the two themes together, they also analyze the relationship between scholarship and the rest of the world. The book is published to commemorate the 25th anniversary of the Fernand Braudel Center. Contributors Samir Amin, Christopher Chase-Dunn, Bart Tromp,. Claudia von Werlhof, Giovanni Arrighi, Pablo Gonzalez-Casanova, Marcel van der Linden, Randall Collins, Mahm ood Mamdani, Boaventura de Sousa Santos, Michel-Rolph Trouillot, Janet Abu-Lughod, Maurice Aymard, and Immanuel Wallerstein.

Concerned about the worldwide state of the social sciences--the relations among the disciplines, and their relationship with both the humanities and the natural sciences--the Calouste Gulbenkian Foundation, based in Lisbon, established in 1993 the Gulbenkian Commission on the Restructuring of the Social Sciences. It comprised a distinguished international group of scholars--six from the social sciences, two from the natural sciences, and two from the humanities.
The report first explores how social science was historically constructed as a form of knowledge and why it was divided into a specific set of relatively standard disciplines in a process that went on between the late eighteenth century and 1945. It then reveals the ways in which world developments since 1945 have raised questions about this intellectual division of labor and have therefore reopened the issues of organizational structuring that had been put into place in the previous period. The report goes on to elucidate a series of basic intellectual questions about which there has been much recent debate. Finally, it discusses in what ways the social sciences can be intelligently restructured in the light of this history and the recent debates.

This discussion of the political manifestations of world systems includes the roles of the U.S.A. and the U.S.S.R., the relations of Third World states to the capitalist "core" and the potential for socialist or revolutionary change.

This book examines the changing nature of global inequalities and efforts that are being made to move toward a more egalitarian world society. The contributors are world historical sociologists and geographers who place the contemporary issues of unequal power, wealth and income in a global historical perspective. The geographers examine the roles of geopolitics and patterns of warfare in the historical development of the modern world-system, and the sociologists examine endeavours to improve the situations of poor peoples and nations and to engage the challenges of sustainability that are linked with global inequalities. Overcoming Global Inequalities contains cutting-edge research from engaged social scientists intended to help humanity deal with the challenges of global inequality in the 21st century.

Die erfolgreiche Einfuhrung in die Welt-System-Analyse von Immanuel Wallerstein liegt nun erstmals in deutscher UEbersetzung vor. Immanuel Wallerstein liefert eine pragnante und leicht zugangliche Einfuhrung in den umfangreichen Ansatz der Welt-System-Analyse, den er selbst vor uber vierzig Jahren auf den Weg brachte, um die Geschichte und die Entwicklung der modernen Welt zu erklaren. Der Autor beschreibt die Wissensstrukturen und Mechanismen, auf denen das Welt-System basiert. Daruber hinaus zeigt er, welche Charakteristika die Welt-System-Analyse kennzeichnen: die Betonung von Welt-Systemen an Stelle von Nationalstaaten, die historischen Prozesse und deren Entfaltung uber lange Zeitraume sowie die Integration von Wissensbestanden, die fur gewoehnlich voneinander getrennt wahrgenommen werden - wie historisches, politologisches, wirtschaftswissenschaftliches und soziologisches Wissen.Die Welt-System-Analyse hat sich als eine haufig genutzte Methode in den historischen Sozialwissenschaften etabliert und ist zu einem gebrauchlichen Referenzpunkt in Globalisierungsdiskussionen geworden.

Uncertain Worlds is the definitive presentation of the evolution of world-systems analysis from the point of view of its founder, Immanuel Wallerstein. Few theorists have offered a more systematic theory of what has become known as 'globalisation' than Wallerstein. The book includes a one-of-kind interview with Wallerstein by Carlos Rojas, a conversation between Wallerstein and Lemert about the history of the field as it has come down to the present time, a long essay by Lemert on the uncertainties of the modern world-system, as well as a preface by Rojas and a concluding essay by Wallerstein. No other book lends such biographical, historical, and personal nuance to the biography of world-systems analysis and, thus, to the history of our times. The will be a key reference book for students of global politics, economics and international relations.

Immanuel Wallerstein draws on a lifetime of study of long-term historical change to shed light in his newest book on the consequences of the recent, significant turn in U.S. foreign and economic policies. Alternatives shows how the U.S. has been in decline since the 1970s and how these longer trends dovetail with current Bush administration policies, which he describes as an attempt to reverse the decline in ways that are disastrous to the future of the country and the world. The book's middle section is a log of insightful commentaries written between 2001 and 2004 detailing how the Bush administration has broken the pattern of foreign policies set by six presidents from Richard Nixon to Bill Clinton. Wallerstein suggests that a threshold has been crossed that will make it difficult for future presidents to practice the kind of 'soft' multilateralism in foreign policy they have used in the past and maintain effective alliances. He also shows, surprisingly, why 'globalization' already is dead, especially in terms of the United States' ability to dominate economically in the manner that it has since WWII. He calls for a major revision of U.S. policies, and not an attempt merely to return to the pre-Bush foreign policy. In conclusion, Wallerstein's visionary book speaks to the challenges the U.S. must face if it is to play a meaningful and progressive role in the world-system.

This book, first published in 1992, seeks an explanation of the pattern of sharp discrepancy of wage levels across the world-economy for work of comparable productivity. It explores how far such differences can be explained by the different structures of households as 'income-pooling units', examining three key variables: location in the core or periphery of the world-economy; periods of expansion versus periods of contraction in the world-economy; and secular transformation over time. The authors argue that both the boundaries of households and their sources of income are molded by the changing patterns of the world-economy, but are also modes of defense against its pressures. Drawing empirical data from eight local regions in three different zones - the United States, Mexico and southern Africa - this book presents a systematic and original approach to the intimate link between the micro-structures of households and the structures of the capitalist world-economy at a global level.

This book, first published in 1992, seeks an explanation of the pattern of sharp discrepancy of wage levels across the world-economy for work of comparable productivity. It explores how far such differences can be explained by the different structures of households as 'income-pooling units', examining three key variables: location in the core or periphery of the world-economy; periods of expansion versus periods of contraction in the world-economy; and secular transformation over time. The authors argue that both the boundaries of households and their sources of income are molded by the changing patterns of the world-economy, but are also modes of defense against its pressures. Drawing empirical data from eight local regions in three different zones - the United States, Mexico and southern Africa - this book presents a systematic and original approach to the intimate link between the micro-structures of households and the structures of the capitalist world-economy at a global level.

Immanuel Wallerstein's highly influential, multi-volume opus, "The Modern World-System", is one of this century's greatest works of social science. An innovative, panoramic reinterpretation of global history, it traces the emergence and development of the modern world from the sixteenth to the twentieth century. This new volume encompasses the nineteenth century from the revolutionary era of 1789 to the First World War. In this crucial period, three great ideologies - conservatism, liberalism, and radicalism - emerged in response to the worldwide cultural transformation that came about when the French Revolution legitimized the sovereignty of the people. Wallerstein tells how capitalists, and Great Britain, brought relative order to the world and how liberalism triumphed as the dominant ideology.

The dominant view in social science has been that the modern world shows a pattern of linear development in which all positive social trends rise (albeit at an uncertain speed) toward a relatively homogenized world. In the post-1945 period, some analysts contested this linear model, arguing that the modern world was rather one of escalating polarization. Their view was strengthened by the separate emergence within the natural sciences of complexity studies, which suggested that natural systems inevitably moved away from equilibrium, and at a certain point bifurcated radically. This book, based on a truly collaborative international research project, evaluates the empirical evidence in this debate in order to (1) give an adequate portrayal of the historical realities of the world-system, (2) draw a nuanced assessment about this debate, and (3) provide the basis on which we can not only envisage probable future trends but also draw conclusions about the policy and/or political implications of past and future research. The work of ten research clusters, based on crucial topics of overlapping nodes of social activity, provides a vantage-point with which to assess the basic issue; a clear picture emerges of "world-historical interpretations of continuing polarizations."

Forty years after the defeat of Nazism, and twenty years after the great wave of decolonization, how is it that racism remains a growing phenomenon? What are the special characteristics of contemporary racism? How can it be related to class divisions and to the contradictions of the nation-state? And how far, in turn, does racism today compel us to rethink the relationship between class struggles and nationalism? This book attempts to answer these fundamental questions through a remarkable dialogue between the French philosopher Etienne Balibar and the American historian and sociologist Immanuel Wallerstein. Each brings to the debate the fruits of over two decades of analytical work, greatly inspired, respectively, by Louis Althusser and Fernand Braudel. Both authors challenge the commonly held notion of racism as a continuation of, or throwback to, the xenophobias of past societies and communities. They analyze it instead as a social relation indissolubly tied to present social structures-the nation-state, the division of labor, and the division between core and periphery-which are themselves constantly being reconstructed. Despite their productive disagreements, Balibar and Wallerstein both emphasize the modernity of racism and the need to understand its relation to contemporary capitalism and class struggle. Above all, their dialogue reveals the forms of present and future social conflict, in a world where the crisis of the nation-state is accompanied by an alarming rise of nationalism and chauvinism.

This book is nothing short of a state-of-the-world address, delivered by a scholar uniquely suited to the task. Immanuel Wallerstein, one of the most prominent social scientists of our time, documents the profound transformations our world is undergoing. With these transformations, he argues, come equally profound changes in how we understand the world.

Wallerstein begins his work with an appraisal of significant recent events -- the collapse of the Leninist states, the exhaustion of national liberation movements, the rise of East Asia, challenges to national sovereignty, dangers to the environment, debates about national identity, and the marginalization of migrant populations. Wallerstein places these events and trends in the context of the changing modern world-system as a whole and identifies the historic choices they put before us. The End of the World As We Know It concludes with a crucial analysis of the momentous intellectual challenges to social science as we know it today and suggests possible responses to them.

In World-Systems Analysis, Immanuel Wallerstein provides a concise and accessible introduction to the comprehensive approach that he pioneered thirty years ago to understanding the history and development of the modern world. Since Wallerstein first developed world-systems analysis, it has become a widely utilized methodology within the historical social sciences and a common point of reference in discussions of globalization. Now, for the first time in one volume, Wallerstein offers a succinct summary of world-systems analysis and a clear outline of the modern world-system, describing the structures of knowledge upon which it is based, its mechanisms, and its future.Wallerstein explains the defining characteristics of world-systems analysis: its emphasis on world-systems rather than nation-states, on the need to consider historical processes as they unfold over long periods of time, and on combining within a single analytical framework bodies of knowledge usually viewed as distinct from one another-such as history, political science, economics, and sociology. He describes the world-system as a social reality comprised of interconnected nations, firms, households, classes, and identity groups of all kinds. He identifies and highlights the significance of the key moments in the evolution of the modern world-system: the development of a capitalist world-economy in the sixteenth-century, the beginning of two centuries of liberal centrism in the French Revolution of 1789, and the undermining of that centrism in the global revolts of 1968. Intended for general readers, students, and experienced practitioners alike, this book presents a complete overview of world-systems analysis by its original architect.

A collection of essays on the working of capitalism as a world system, over historical time as well as the contemporary era, focuses on the conflicts between core and periphery and bourgeois and proletarian.