Immanuel Wallerstein

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Immanuel Wallerstein (2008)

Immanuel Wallerstein (born September 28, 1930 in New York City , † August 31, 2019 in Branford (Connecticut) ) was an American sociologist and social historian . He was the founder of a world systems analysis that summarizes aspects of history , economics , political science and sociology .

Life

The family name is traced back to the Swabian town of Wallerstein . It is believed that the ancestors of Immanuel Maurice Wallerstein, who once resided there, fled to Galicia, Hungary and the Czech Republic due to late medieval or early modern pogroms and that the Wallersteins returned to Germany in the 19th century. Wallerstein's parents, his father was a doctor, emigrated from Berlin to the USA during the 1920s .

After the Second World War studied Wallerstein sociology at New York's Columbia University , where he earned in 1951 a BA , in 1954 the MA and in 1959 the Ph.D. His academic teachers included Robert K. Merton , Paul F. Lazarsfeld , Seymor M. Lipset , Daniel Bell, and Johan Galtung .

From 1958 he was a lecturer at Columbia University. When it came in connection with student protests, with which he sympathized, to disputes at the college, he went in 1971 as a sociology professor at McGill University in Canada . In 1976 he returned to New York, where he taught as a professor at Binghamton University until his retirement in 1999 . Until 2005 he was director of the Fernand Braudel Center for the Study of Economies, Historical Systems, and Civilizations at Binghamton University, which he founded.

Wallerstein held various visiting professorships at universities around the world, received numerous honorary degrees, was several short-term directeur d'études associé at the École des Hautes Études en Sciences Sociales in Paris and from 1994 to 1998 president of the International Sociological Association . In 1998 he was elected to the American Academy of Arts and Sciences . Since 2000 he has been a Senior Research Scholar at Yale University . Among other things, he is considered to be the founder of the so-called world system theory , but he refused to have created a theory and preferred the term "world system analysis". In 2004 he received the gold medal of the International Kondratieff Foundation .

Scientific work

See also: world system theory

Wallerstein was initially an expert on post-colonial Africa , which his publications dealt almost exclusively with until the early 1970s. Then he began to make a name for himself as a historian and analyst of the global capitalist economy on the macroscopic level. His early criticism of global capitalism and his advocacy of “anti-systemic movements” have made him, like Noam Chomsky and Pierre Bourdieu , a gray eminence of globalization criticism inside and outside the scientific community.

His most important work, The Modern World-System , appeared in four volumes in 1974, 1980, 1989 and 2011. In it, Wallerstein draws mainly on three intellectual influences:

  • Karl Marx , whom he follows by assigning crucial importance to fundamental economic factors, especially labor , but defining capitalism differently (see below). Unlike Marx, he does not equate capitalism with industrial society. In contrast to Marx, he does not see abstract theory and concrete history in a relationship of tension, but for him they have to be connected. This approach also comes from close by
  • to the French historians of the Annales School , especially Fernand Braudel , who described the development and political implications of extensive networks of economic exchange relationships in Europe from 1400 to 1800;
  • to the dependency theory , which deals with the effects of the asymmetrical structure of the interaction relationships between the developed centers and the underdeveloped peripheries of the international system. Above all, it emphasizes the internal structural consequences in the countries and regions that are dependent on the centers in the context of a functional link between the development of the centers and the underdevelopment of the periphery.

Wallerstein already emphasized the increasing importance of the North-South conflict at the height of the Cold War . He rejected the term “ Third World ”. He claimed that there was only 'one world', the parts of which were closely linked by a network of economic exchange relationships based on the division of labor - i.e. H. a “world economy” or a “world system” in which the “opposition of capital and labor”, which takes a back seat to the conflict between center and periphery, and the endless accumulation of capital by competing actors are responsible for tensions.

Wallerstein located the origin of the modern world system in northwestern Europe during the so-called long 16th century. If in the Middle Ages he saw small centers next to each other, which at most exchanged luxury goods with one another, then at the end of the 15th century nation states came into being. The associated centralization of violence and the necessity of a large standing army resulted in higher expenditures that could only be handled through increased productivity, which in turn led to an expansion into other parts of the world. This dependence on mass trade, which was caused by the restructuring of the economy, also shows the interest and support of the states for this emerging world system.

However, Wallerstein based this development on various basic requirements:

  • The expansion of the volume of trade through these countries
  • The different work control methods
  • The establishment of a strong central authority in the centers of the European world economy.

He also saw the general trust of the people in central power as necessary.

In the 16th century, new industries emerged through investments made possible by the accumulation of capital in the division of labor. Because the difference between rising prices and falling wages created capital that could be used profitably for these investments. As a result, the world economy was divided into wage labor, share economy, and slavery and feudalism.

Viewed culturally, politically and economically, this shows that the capitalist world system is anything but homogeneous - rather, it is characterized by fundamental differences in the development of civilization and in the accumulation of political power and capital. In contrast to affirmative theories about modernization and capitalism , Wallerstein interprets these differences not as mere residues and irregularities that would be overcome within the framework of global development, but as a consequence of the expansion of the world system. According to Wallerstein , a permanent division of the world into a core / center , a semi-periphery and a periphery is an inherent characteristic of the world system.

There is a fundamental and institutionally stabilized division of labor between the core and the periphery. While the core is technically advanced and produces complex goods, the role of the periphery is to provide raw materials, agricultural products and cheap labor for the expanding actors of the core. The cause of this division of labor is the monopoly of high-tech industries in the center, which is maintained by the strong states in the center. The exchange of goods between the core and the periphery takes place as an "unequal exchange", in which unequal producers exchange equivalents, so that a transfer of added value takes place in the center.

The core and the periphery are not fixed on specific geographical areas and mobility of individual actors is entirely possible, even if the division into the center and periphery itself is not resolved. There is a semi-peripheral zone that functions as the periphery in relation to the core and in relation to the periphery however, as the core and thus obscure the prosperity gap between the center and the periphery. This semi-periphery is a discovery by Wallerstein, who with its help explains the political stability of the world system.

Wallerstein's definitions of terms

World system

As a world system, Wallerstein defines an area that does not necessarily have to encompass the entire globe in which there is an almost self-sufficient economy based on the division of labor. The economic relations within this economy can be tributary, in which case a world empire is formed, or market economy, which would result in a world economy. According to Wallerstein, the capitalist world system, which now includes the entire earth, is a world economy. A classic example of a world empire is z. B. the Roman Empire , or ancient and medieval China .

The world system theory was used by Christian Giordano as the basis for dividing Europe into historical regions .

capitalism

According to Immanuel Wallerstein, capitalism is “the only mode of production in which the maximization of added value is itself rewarded. In every other historical system part of production was intended for use and part for exchange , but only in capitalism are all producers primarily rewarded for the exchange value they produce and punished to the extent that they neglect it ” .

Therefore, for Wallerstein, capitalism is not necessarily the exploitation of wage labor, but primarily the production of goods for exchange. So it is possible that feudal modes of production and even slavery can occur in the capitalist world system. Capitalism is characterized by the unlimited urge to accumulate capital through reinvestment.

market

At Wallerstein , the market is always an imperfect market , which is characterized by the actors' efforts to monopolize. The prerequisite for this monopoly is the strong state, which acts as the agent of national capital.

Center / core

Center / core are the areas within the world economy in which there is relative prosperity due to high productivity and the appropriation of surplus value from the periphery. According to Wallerstein, these factors can only be maintained if a strong state is able to monopolize the production technology for the national economy over its competitors. The center is characterized by these strong states, as the high level of prosperity ensures a relatively conflict-free interaction between the actors. The state in the center is so strong that it can counteract an international linkage of capital, so that capitals are supposedly only to be viewed in a national framework, while the state is their agent on the international level.

Periphery

In the periphery there is production of primary goods with a relatively low technical level. Their states are weak as major internal conflicts arise and the states of the center destabilize the state from outside. The role of the state in the periphery is therefore primarily limited to granting a smooth exchange with the center.

Semi-periphery

The semi-periphery stands between the periphery and the center. It appropriates surplus value from the periphery as well as having to cede surplus value to the center itself. Their states are often authoritarian, which Wallerstein sees as a sign of the weakness of their political structures, but they fulfill an important political function for the center, which allows them to build a repressive, but stable state apparatus. In addition to their political function, semi-peripheral states often act as agents of the center from a military point of view.

hegemony

According to Wallerstein, under certain conditions a state emerges from the center and gains the position of a hegemon . The reason for this is its temporary superiority in the industrial, agricultural and financial sectors. The hegemon uses this to enforce a free trade system, which corresponds to its economic superiority. In the hegemonic phases of the world system, the transfer of surplus value from the periphery to the center is particularly strong. However, since the periods of economic superiority are short and are shortened by the costs that the hegemony incurs, the hegemon quickly descends again to the rank of a normal central state.

According to Wallerstein, there have been 3 hegemonic phases up to now, the hegemonic powers of which were the Netherlands (17th century), Great Britain (18th / 19th century) and the USA (20th century). Wallerstein argues that US hegemony has been in decline since 1968 and that it ended with the collapse of the Soviet Union and the Iraq War in 1990 at the latest .

Cycles, secular trends and the crisis of the world system

For Wallerstein, the world system moves continuously in a cycle of so-called Kondratieff waves , which are characterized by the development of new leading sectors. These cycles lead to regular critical escalations, which also contribute to the end of hegemonic phases and, above all, considerably increase mobility within the world system. Wallerstein describes the tendencies as crisis which, in his opinion, will lead to the downfall of the capitalist world system within the next 30 years. These are the geographical, demographic and ecological limits of the expansion of the world system, the increasing polarization between the periphery and the center, the decline of the middle class (whose rebellion Wallerstein sees in the 1968 movement) and the decreasing opportunities for integration within the center (dismantling of the welfare state due to increased competition, ...). Wallerstein sees either a socialist world state or a tributary-aristocratic world empire as the successor to the capitalist world system.

reception

Reviews

Wallerstein's theory has also provoked sharp criticism, not just from neoliberal or conservative circles. Historians contested that some of his theses were historically imprecise. Hartmut Elsenhans , for example, objected that he overestimated the role that the exploitation of the periphery played in the development of capitalism. Even if Wallerstein is assigned to the Marxist theorists, his theory has also met with harsh criticism from Marxists because of the obvious breaks with Marxist theory (role of the state, concept of capitalism, ...). For example, Benno Teschke criticized Wood Wallerstein's “commercialization model” of the emergence of modern capitalism following Ellen Meiksins . If this is understood merely as a “gradual, quantitative expansion of the market” and as a profit-oriented market structure, the specifics of modern capitalism, in contrast to commercial capitalist relationships, are lost and capitalist dynamics are dehistoricized, “which leads to senseless speculations over 5000 years of the world system “Lead.

Further effect

Nevertheless, Wallerstein's theory is now met with great interest from critics of globalization , who have so far lacked a solid and uniform theoretical underpinning, as was typical for the classic workers' movement of the 19th and 20th centuries.

Fonts

  • 1961: Africa, The Politics of Independence . Vintage, New York
  • 1964: The Road to Independence: Ghana and the Ivory Coast . Mouton, Paris & The Hague
  • 1967: Africa: The Politics of Unity , Random House, New York
  • 1969: University in Turmoil: The Politics of Change . Atheneum, New York
  • 1972 (with Evelyn Jones Rich): Africa: Tradition & Change . Random House, New York
  • 1974: The Modern World-System , Vol. I: Capitalist Agriculture and the Origins of the European World-Economy in the Sixteenth Century , Academic Press, New York / London
    • (German translation by Angelika Schweikhart, 1986) The modern world system. The beginnings of capitalist agriculture and the European world economy in the 16th century , Syndikat, Frankfurt am Main / Promedia, Vienna, ISBN 3-85371-142-1 .
  • 1979: The Capitalist World-Economy . Cambridge University Press, Cambridge
  • 1979: Rise and future decline of the capitalist world system. To lay the foundation for comparative analysis . In: Senghaas, Dieter (Ed.): Capitalist World Economy. Controversies about their origin and their development dynamics, [1979], Frankfurt am Main: Suhrkamp Verlag ²1982
  • 1980: The Ottoman empire and the capitalist world-economy. Some questions for research . Meteksan, Ankara
  • 1980: The Modern World-System , Vol. II: Mercantilism and the Consolidation of the European World-Economy, 1600-1750 . Academic Press, New York
    • (German translation by Gerald Hödl 1998) The modern world system II. Mercantilism : Europe between 1600 and 1750 , Promedia, Vienna, ISBN 3-85371-138-3 .
  • 1982 (with Terence K. Hopkins et al.): World-Systems Analysis: Theory and Methodology . Say, Beverly Hills
  • 1982 (with Samir Amin , Giovanni Arrighi and Andre Gunder Frank ): Dynamics of Global Crisis , Macmillan, London
  • 1983: Historical Capitalism . Verso, London
  • 1984: The Politics of the World Economy. The States, the Movements and the Civilizations . Cambridge University Press, Cambridge
  • 1986: Africa and the Modern World . Africa World Press, Trenton NJ
  • 1989: The Modern World-System , Vol. III: The Second Great Expansion of the Capitalist World-Economy, 1730-1840's . Academic Press, San Diego
    • (German translation by David Mayer 2004): The modern world system III. The Great Expansion: The Consolidation of the World Economy in the Long 18th Century . Promedia, Vienna, ISBN 3-85371-223-1 .
  • 1989 (with Giovanni Arrighi and Terence K. Hopkins): Antisystemic Movements . Verso, London
  • 1990 (with Samir Amin , Giovanni Arrighi and Andre Gunder Frank ): Transforming the Revolution: Social Movements and the World-System . Monthly Review Press, New York
  • 1988 (with Étienne Balibar): Race, nation, classe: les identités ambiguës . Découverte, Paris, ISBN 2-7071-1777-3 .
    • (German translation by Michael Haupt and Ilse Utz 1990, ²1992): Rasse, Klasse, Nation. Ambivalent identities . Argument, Hamburg, ISBN 3-88619-386-1
  • 1991: Geopolitics and Geoculture: Essays on the Changing World-System . Cambridge University Press, Cambridge
  • 1991: Unthinking Social Science: The Limits of Nineteenth Century Paradigms . Polity, Cambridge
    • (German translation by Nicole Jeschke and Britta Krüger 1995): The social sciences “thinking broken”. The Limits of the 19th Century Paradigms . Beltz Athenaeum, Weinheim, ISBN 3-89547-020-1
  • 1995: After Liberalism . New Press, New York
  • 1995: Historical Capitalism, with Capitalist Civilization . Verso, London
  • 1996: Open the Social Sciences: Report of the Gulbenkian Commission on the Restructuring of the Social Sciences . Stanford University Press, ISBN 0-8047-2727-9
    • (German translation by Christoph Münz 1996): Open the social sciences. A report by the Gulbenkian Commission on the Restructuring of the Social Sciences . Campus, Frankfurt / Main, ISBN 3-593-35610-4 .
  • 1998: Utopistics: Or, Historical Choices of the Twenty-first Century. New Press, New York
  • 1999: The End of the World As We Know It: Social Science for the Twenty-first Century . University of Minnesota Press, Minneapolis
  • 2003: Decline of American Power: The US in a Chaotic World . New Press, New York
    • (German translation by Britta Dutke 2004): Crash or descent of the eagle? The decline of American power . VSA, Hamburg, ISBN 3-89965-057-3 .
  • 2004: World Systems Analysis: An Introduction . Durham, North Carolina: Duke University Press.
  • 2004: Alternatives: The US Confronts the World . Boulder, Colorado: Paradigm Press.
  • 2004: The uncertainties of knowledge . Temple University Press, Philadelphia, ISBN 1-59213-242-1
  • 2006: European Universalism: The Rhetoric of Power . New York: New Press.
    • (German translation by Jürgen Pelzer 2007, ²2010): The barbarism of others. European universalism . Berlin: Wagenbach, ISBN 3-8031-2554-5 .
  • 2011: The Modern World-System , Vol. IV: Centrist Liberalism Triumphant, 1789-1914 . University of California Press, ISBN 0-520-26760-5 / ISBN 0-520-26761-3 .
    • (German translation by Gregor Kneussel 2012): The modern world system IV. The triumphal march of liberalism (1789-1914) . Promedia, Vienna, ISBN 3-85371-347-5 .
  • 2013: (with Randall Collins et al.): Does Capitalism have a Future? , Oxford University Press.
    • (German translation by Thomas Laugstien 2014): Is capitalism dying? Five scenarios for the 21st century . Campus, Frankfurt / New York, ISBN 978-3-593-50176-5 .
  • 2018: World System Analysis: An Introduction. (New Library of Social Sciences; edited and translated by Felix Merz, Julien Bucher and Sylke Nissen), Springer VS, Wiesbaden, ISBN 978-3658219611 .

literature

Web links

Commons : Immanuel Wallerstein  - collection of pictures, videos and audio files

Individual evidence

  1. ^ Neil Genzlinger: Immanuel Wallerstein, Sociologist With Global View, Dies at 88 . Report in The New York Times of September 10, 2019 at www.nytimes.com (English)
  2. ↑ Information on the biography is based, unless otherwise documented, on: Dieter Boris : Immanuel Wallerstein . In: Dirk Kaesler (ed.): Current theories of sociology. From Shmuel N. Eisenstadt to postmodernism. CH Beck, Munich 2005, pp. 168-195, here pp. 168 f.
  3. ^ Lutz Zündorf: On the topicality of Immanuel Wallerstein. Introduction to his work. VS-Verlag, Wiesbaden, 2010, p. 9.
  4. ↑ Конкурсы и медали Н. Д. Кондратьева. МФК - Международный фонд Н. Д. Кондратьева, archived from the original on October 29, 2013 ; Retrieved September 1, 2019 (Russian).
  5. ↑ Karl Kaser et al. a. (Ed.): Europe and the borders in the head. Wieser-Verlag, Klagenfurt 2003, pp. 113-134.
  6. ↑ Immanuel Wallerstein: The class conflict in the capitalist world economy. 1998.
  7. ↑ Ralf Streck: Immanuel Wallerstein: "In 30 years there will be no more capitalism". In: Telepolis . February 6, 2009, archived from the original on August 14, 2012 ; accessed on September 1, 2019 .
  8. ↑ Benno Teschke: Myth 1648. Classes, geopolitics and the emergence of the European state system. Münster 2007, pp. 136, 190.
  9. ↑ bibliographic evidence
personal data
SURNAME Wallerstein, Immanuel
BRIEF DESCRIPTION American social scientist
DATE OF BIRTH September 28, 1930
PLACE OF BIRTH New York City
DATE OF DEATH August 31, 2019
Place of death Branford (CT)