Immanuel Wallerstein

He was the 13th president of International Sociological Association (1994–1998).

Immanuel Wallerstein studied at Columbia University. The recorded working language is French and English. The field of work recorded is sociology, historical sociology and world economy. Employment is recorded with Binghamton University, Columbia University and McGill University. Works named in the authority record are The Modern World-System. Distinctions recorded are Officer of Arts and Letters, W.E.B. Du Bois Career of Distinguished Scholarship award, honorary doctor of the University of Brasília and Honorary Doctorate from the National Autonomous University of Mexico.

• Name — Immanuel Wallerstein • Born — 28 September 1930 • Birthplace — New York City, U.S. • Died — 31 August 2019 • Place of death — Branford, Connecticut, U.S. • Known for — World-systems theory • Spouse — Beatrice Friedman • Children — Katharine Wallerstein, Robert Morgenstern, Susan Morgenstern • Discipline — Sociologist, Historian • Sub Discipline — Historical sociology, Comparative sociology, World-systems theory • Alma Mater — Columbia University (BA: 1951, MA: 1954, PhD: 1959) • Thesis Title — The Emergence of Two West African Nations: Ghana and the Ivory Coast • Thesis Year — 1959 • Doctoral Advisor — Hans L Zetterberg, Robert Staughton Lynd • Notable Students — Georgi Derluguian, Michael Hechter, John R. Logan, Beverly J. Silver • Workplaces — Columbia University McGill University Binghamton University École des Hautes Études en Sciences Sociales Yale University • Website — http: www.iwallerstein.com/ People

His parents, Sara Günsberg (born in 1895) and Menachem Lazar Wallerstein (born in 1890), were Polish Jews from Galicia who moved to Berlin, because of World War I, where they married in 1919. Two years later, Sara gave birth to their first son, Solomon. In 1923, the Wallerstein family emigrated to New York, where Immanuel was born. On the "list of alien passengers for the United States" at the time of his family's emigration, the nationality of his mother and brother was described as Polish. Having grown up in a politically conscious family, Wallerstein first became interested in world affairs as a teenager. He received all three of his degrees from Columbia University: a BA in 1951, an MA in 1954, and a PhD in 1959, where he completed his dissertation under the supervision of Hans L. Zetterberg and Robert Staughton Lynd. However, throughout his life, Wallerstein also studied at other universities around the world, including Oxford University from 1955 to 1956, Université libre de Bruxelles, Universite Paris 7 Denis Diderot, and Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México. From 1951 to 1953 Wallerstein served in the U.S. Army. After his discharge, he wrote a master's thesis on McCarthyism as a phenomenon of American political culture. The widely cited work, as Wallerstein himself later stated, "confirmed my sense that I should consider myself, in the language of the 1950s, a 'political sociologist. Wallerstein married Beatrice Friedman in 1964, and had a daughter, Katharine Ellen Wallerstein, two years later. He was stepfather to Beatrice's two children from a previous marriage. He and Beatrice had five grandchildren.

During his time at Columbia University he was a supporter of students who were active during Columbia University protests of 1968 opposing the university's involvement in the Vietnam War. Originally, Wallerstein's principal sub-area of study was not American affairs, but the politics of the non-European world, specifically India and Africa. For two decades Wallerstein researched Africa, publishing numerous books and articles, and in 1973 he became president of the African Studies Association.

Wallerstein's academic career began at Columbia University where he was an instructor and then associate professor of sociology from 1958 to 1971. From there he moved to McGill University, in Montreal where he taught from 1971 to 1976. He became distinguished professor of sociology at SUNY Binghamton University from 1976 to 1999. In 1976 Wallerstein was offered the unique opportunity to pursue a new avenue of research, and so became head of the Fernand Braudel Center for the Study of Economies, Historical Systems and Civilization at Binghamton University in New York, whose mission was "to engage in the analysis of large-scale social change over long periods of historical time". The Center opened with the publishing support of a new journal, Review, (of which Wallerstein was the founding editor), and produced a body of work that "went a long way toward invigorating sociology and its sister disciplines, especially history and political-economy". Wallerstein served as a distinguished professor of sociology at SUNY-Binghamton until his retirement in 1999. During his career Wallerstein held visiting-professor posts in Hong Kong, British Columbia, and Amsterdam, among numerous others. He was awarded multiple honorary titles, intermittently served as Directeur d'études associé at the École des Hautes Études en Sciences Sociales in Paris, and served as president of the International Sociological Association between 1994 and 1998. At this time he also held a titled professorship at New York University and lectured at Columbia University. Similarly, during the 1990s he chaired the Gulbenkian Commission on the Restructuring of the Social Sciences, whose object was to indicate a direction for social scientific inquiry for the next 50 years. Between 2000 and his death in 2019, Wallerstein worked as a senior research scholar at Yale University. He was also a member of the Advisory Editors Council of the Social Evolution & History journal. In 2003, he received the "Career of Distinguished Scholarship Award" from the American Sociological Association, and in 2004 the International N. D. Kondratieff Foundation and the Russian Academy of Natural Sciences (RAEN) awarded him the Gold Kondratieff Medal. Wallerstein died on August 31, 2019, from an infection, at the age of 88. Wallerstein was remembered for his willingness to engage personally with younger scholars and to encourage their intellectual work. During his time as a lecturer some of the students in attendance recalled him as "a calm, reserved, elegant man". When taking criticism for his thesis, he would usually be calm and collected. As well as hinting at the fact that he was almost disappointed for the people or audience for not fully comprehending what he wished to establish.

section • Illustration — A model of a core-periphery system like that used by Wallerstein 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). In it, he argues that the modern world system is distinguished from empires by its reliance on economic control of the world order by a dominating capitalist center (core) in systemic economic and political relation to peripheral and semi-peripheral world areas. 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. Areas which have so far remained outside the reach of the world-system enter it at the stage of "periphery". There is a fundamental and institutionally stabilized "division of labor" between core and periphery: while the core has a high level of technological development and manufactures complex products, the role of the periphery is to supply raw materials, agricultural products, and cheap labor for the expanding agents of the core. Economic exchange between core and periphery takes place on unequal terms: the periphery is forced to sell its products at low prices, but has to buy the core's products at comparatively high prices. Once established, this unequal state tends to stabilize itself due to inherent, quasi-deterministic constraints. The statuses of core and periphery are not exclusive and fixed geographically, but are relative to each other. A zone defined as "semi-periphery" acts as a periphery to the core and as a core to the periphery. At the end of the 20th century, this zone would comprise Eastern Europe, China, Brazil, and Mexico. Core and peripheral zones can co-exist in the same location. One effect of the expansion of the world-system is the commodification of things, including human labor. Natural resources, land, labor, and human relationships are gradually being stripped of their "intrinsic" value and turned into commodities in a market which determines their exchange value. In the last two decades of his life, Wallerstein increasingly focused on the intellectual foundations of the modern world-system and the pursuit of universal theories of human behavior. In addition, he showed interest in the "structures of knowledge" defined by the disciplinary division between sociology, anthropology, political science, economics, and the humanities, which he himself regarded as Eurocentric. In analyzing them, he was highly influenced by the "new sciences" of theorists like Ilya Prigogine.

Wallerstein's definition follows dependency theory, which intended to combine the developments of the different societies since the 16th century in different regions into one collective development. The main characteristic of his definition is the development of a global division of labour, including the existence of independent political units (in this case, states) at the same time. There is no political center, compared to global empires like the Roman Empire; instead, the capitalist world-system is identified by the global market economy. It is divided into core, semi-periphery, and periphery regions, and is ruled by the capitalist mode of production.

Defines the difference between developed and developing countries, characterized e.g. by power or wealth. The core refers to developed countries, the periphery to the dependent developing countries. The main reason for the position of the developed countries is economic power. Wallerstein "used the term core to suggest a multicentric region containing a group of states rather than the term center, which implies a hierarchy with a single peak."

Defines states that are located between core and periphery, and who benefit from the periphery through unequal exchange relations. At the same time, the core benefits from the semi-periphery through unequal exchange relations.

Defines a kind of monopoly where there is more than one service provider for a particular good/service. Wallerstein claims that quasi-monopolies are self-liquidating because new sellers go into the market by exerting political pressure to open markets to competition.

A Kondratiev wave is defined as a cyclical tendency in the world's economy. It is also known as a supercycle. Wallerstein argues that global wars are tied to Kondratiev waves. According to him, global conflicts occur as the summer phase of a wave begins, which is when production of goods and services around the world are on an upswing.

• Year — Title — Author(s) — Publisher • 1961 — Africa, The Politics of Independence — Immanuel Wallerstein — New York: Vintage Books • 1964 — The Road to Independence: Ghana and the Ivory Coast — Immanuel Wallerstein — Paris & The Hague: Mouton • 1967 — Africa: The Politics of Unity — Immanuel Wallerstein — New York: Random House • 1969 — University in Turmoil: The Politics of Change — Immanuel Wallerstein — New York: Atheneum • 1972 — Africa: Tradition & Change — Immanuel Wallerstein with Evelyn Jones Rich — New York: Random House • 1974 — The Modern World-System, vol. I: Capitalist Agriculture and the Origins of the European World-Economy in the Sixteenth Century — Immanuel Wallerstein — New York/London: Academic Press • 1979 — The Capitalist World-Economy — Immanuel Wallerstein — Cambridge University Press • 1980 — The Modern World-System, vol. II: Mercantilism and the Consolidation of the European World-Economy, 1600–1750 — Immanuel Wallerstein — New York: Academic Press • 1982 — World-Systems Analysis: Theory and Methodology — Immanuel Wallerstein with Terence K. Hopkins et al. — Beverly Hills: Sage • 1982 — Dynamics of Global Crisis — Immanuel Wallerstein with Samir Amin, Giovanni Arrighi and Andre Gunder Frank — London: Macmillan • 1983 — Historical Capitalism — Immanuel Wallerstein — London: Verso • 1984 — The Politics of the World-Economy. The States, the Movements and the Civilizations — Immanuel Wallerstein — Cambridge: Cambridge University Press • 1986 — Africa and the Modern World — Immanuel Wallerstein — Trenton, NJ: Africa World Press • 1989 — The Modern World-System, vol. III: The Second Great Expansion of the Capitalist World-Economy, 1730-1840s — Immanuel Wallerstein — San Diego: Academic Press • 1989 — Antisystemic Movements — Immanuel Wallerstein with Giovanni Arrighi and Terence K. Hopkins — London: Verso • 1990 — Transforming the Revolution: Social Movements and the World-System — Immanuel Wallerstein with Samir Amin, Giovanni Arrighi and Andre Gunder Frank — New York: Monthly Review Press • 1991 — Race, Nation, Class: Ambiguous Identities — Immanuel Wallerstein with Étienne Balibar — London: Verso. • 1991 — Geopolitics and Geoculture: Essays on the Changing World-System — Immanuel Wallerstein — Cambridge: Cambridge University Press • 1991 — Unthinking Social Science: The Limits of Nineteenth Century Paradigms — Immanuel Wallerstein — Cambridge: Polity • 1995 — After Liberalism — Immanuel Wallerstein — New York: New Press • 1995 — Historical Capitalism, with Capitalist Civilization — Immanuel Wallerstein — London: Verso • 1998 — Utopistics: Or, Historical Choices of the Twenty-first Century — Immanuel Wallerstein — New York: New Press • 1999 — The End of the World As We Know It: Social Science for the Twenty-first Century — Immanuel Wallerstein — Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press • 2001 — Democracy, Capitalism, and Transformation — Immanuel Wallerstein — Documenta 11, Vienna, March 16, 2001 • 2003 — Decline of American Power: The U.S. in a Chaotic World — Immanuel Wallerstein — New York: New Press • 2004 — The Uncertainties of Knowledge — Immanuel Wallerstein — Philadelphia: Temple University Press • 2004 — World-Systems Analysis: An Introduction — Immanuel Wallerstein — Durham, North Carolina: Duke University Press • 2004 — Alternatives: The U.S. Confronts the World — Immanuel Wallerstein — Boulder, Colorado: Paradigm Press • 2006 — European Universalism: The Rhetoric of Power — Immanuel Wallerstein — New York: New Press • 2011 — The Modern World-System, vol. IV: Centrist Liberalism Triumphant, 1789–1914 — Immanuel Wallerstein — Berkeley: University of California Press • 2013 — Uncertain Worlds: World-Systems Analysis in Changing Times — Immanuel Wallerstein with Charles Lemert and Carlos Antonio Aguirre Rojas — Boulder, CO: Paradigm Publishers • 2013 — Does Capitalism Have a Future? — Immanuel Wallerstein with Randall Collins, Michael Mann, Georgi Derluguian and Craig Calhoun — New York: Oxford University Press • 2015 — The World is Out of Joint: World-Historical Interpretations of Continuing Polarizations — Immanuel Wallerstein (editor) — Boulder, CO: Paradigm Publishers • 2022 — The Global Left: Yesterday, Today, Tomorrow — Immanuel Wallerstein (editor) — Routledge

Immanuel Wallerstein worked in sociology, historical sociology, world economy, history of economic thought and African studies. He was employed by Binghamton University, Columbia University, McGill University and Yale University. He belonged to American Academy of Arts and Sciences and Phi Beta Kappa Society. Recorded as economist, geopolitical analyst, historian, political scientist and writer.