Wallerstein began as an expert on
post-colonial African affairs, which he selected as the focus of his studies after attending international youth conferences in 1951 and 1952. His publications focused almost exclusively on this topic until the early 1970s, when he began to distinguish himself as a historian and theorist of the global
capitalist economy on a macroscopic level. His early criticism of global capitalism and championship of "anti-systemic movements" made him an
éminence grise with the
anti-globalization movement within and outside of the academic community, along with
Noam Chomsky (1928– ) and
Pierre Bourdieu (1930–2002). Wallerstein's most important work,
The Modern World-System, appeared in four volumes between 1974 and 2011. In it, Wallerstein drew on several intellectual influences. From
Karl Marx, Wallerstein took the underlying emphasis on economic factors and their dominance over ideological factors in
global politics, and such ideas as the dichotomy between
capital and labor, while criticizing deterministic or
teleological Marxian views of world economic development through stages such as
feudalism and capitalism. From
dependency theory, he took the key concepts of "core" and "periphery". However, Wallerstein named
Frantz Fanon (1925–1961),
Fernand Braudel (1902–1985), and
Ilya Prigogine (1917–2003) as the three individuals who exerted the greatest influence "in modifying my line of argument (as opposed to deepening a parallel line of argument)." Wallerstein anticipated the growing importance of the
North–South divide at a time when the main world conflict was the
Cold War. Wallerstein was often mocked for arguing since 1980 that the United States is a "
hegemon in decline", but since the
Iraq War this argument has become more widespread. During this time, Wallerstein also argued that the development of the capitalist world economy was detrimental to a large proportion of the world's population. Like Marx, Wallerstein predicted that capitalism will be replaced by a
socialist economy, a view held in the 1970s, but reassessed in the 1980s. He concluded that the successor system(s) is unknowable. Wallerstein both participated in and wrote about the
World Social Forum.
The Modern World-System Wallerstein's first volume on world-systems theory (
The Modern World System, 1974) was predominantly written during a year at the
Center for Advanced Study in the Behavioral Sciences (now affiliated with
Stanford University). Wallerstein rejected the notion of a "
Third World", claiming that there is only one world connected by a complex network of economic exchange relationships — i.e., a "world-economy" or "world-system" in which the "dichotomy of capital and labor" and the endless "accumulation of capital" by competing agents (historically including, but not limited, to nation-states) account for frictions. This approach is known as the world-system theory. Wallerstein located the origin of the modern world-system in 16th-century Western Europe and the Americas. An initially slight advance in capital accumulation in
Britain, the
Dutch Republic, and
France, due to specific political circumstances at the end of the period of feudalism, set in motion a process of gradual expansion. As a result, only one global network or system of economic exchange exists in modern society. By the 19th century, virtually every area on earth was incorporated into the capitalist world-economy. The capitalist world-system is far from homogeneous in cultural, political, and economic terms; instead, it is characterized by fundamental differences in social development, accumulation of political power, and capital. Contrary to affirmative theories of
modernization and capitalism, Wallerstein did not conceive of these differences as mere residues or irregularities that can and will be overcome as the system evolves. A lasting division of the world into
core,
semi-periphery, and
periphery is an inherent feature of world-system theory. Other theories, partially drawn on by Wallerstein, leave out the semi-periphery and do not allow for a grayscale of development. this reduces it to what some call "official" ideologies of states which can then easily be revealed as mere agencies of economic interest. Nevertheless, his analytical approach, along with that of associated theorists such as
Andre Gunder Frank,
Terence Hopkins,
Samir Amin,
Christopher Chase-Dunn, Thomas D. Hall,
Aníbal Quijano and
Giovanni Arrighi, has made a significant impact on the field and has established an institutional base devoted to the general approach of intellectual inquiry. Their works has also attracted strong interest from the anti-globalization movement.
Arthur Stinchcombe was very critical of Wallerstein's
The Modern World-System, writing that the book presents no theoretical argument and no determinate mechanisms. Instead, the theory of the book "reduces to a general imperative for the scholar to look for world system influences, perhaps wise advice but not very specific." Stinchcombe also argues that the book does not define its concepts independently of their effects, thus entailing tautologies regarding cores, peripheries and semi-peripheries. ==Terms and definitions==