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World Systems Theory (WST) provides a holistic perspective to understand human interaction within a global political economic framework. Though largely heralded by academics in the global South, over the years WST has come under scathing critique by Western social scientists declaring that it is inherently deterministic and overly simplifies human interactions. The theory argues that since the early 19th century, all of humankind has been encompassed within one world system-the capitalist world-economy.

WST espouses that human activities can only be examined within this global system, and that parceled examinations of human political economic and social activity at more focused scales are inherently flawed, because they fail to recognize human processes within their broader context. Thus, WST completely dispels the central role that states, nations, and territorially based political entities (e.g., empires) broadly maintain in the social sciences. The importance of understanding and explaining processes within the capitalist world-system can only be done at the global scale-states, nations, classes, and races are merely the social constructs of systemic, capitalist processes. Different systems come and go, but they are always a product of history. Three different systems have existed-mini-systems, world empires, and the capitalist world system (the latter so called because it is the first system to encompass the entire world’s population).

Origins and Development

WST originated with, and is still largely associated with, the sociologist Immanuel Wallerstein, who published his seminal work in 1974-The Modern World System: Capitalist Agriculture and the Origins on the European World-Economy in the Sixteenth Century. Wallerstein was not the first to argue that state-centric analysis was shortsighted and failed to envelop the true extent of human interaction, but he pioneered synergizing of two disparate, yet intricately congruent, theoretical views of world politics. First, he borrowed heavily from the Annales School of history in France-in particular from the work of Fernand Braudel. Historians of this school were dismayed with 20th-century historians’ fetish on the particular details of intra and interstate political processes and diplomacy. They argued that a holistic approach analyzing political figures within the history of ordinary people was necessary for historical analysis and would be far more useful than case-specific analyses of important events throughout history. The Annales School argued that history operated through longue duree-long periods of materialist and economic production that survived regardless of political crises and change.

The second theoretical background interwoven within WST is Marxist theory. In essence, WST is a revision of Marxism itself, attempting to move beyond Marxism’s fixation on state economies and its unconvincing portrayal of nationalism in comparison to class. Wallerstein borrows heavily from neo-Marxist critiques of development theories in modern social science. Development theories are state-centric theories that argue states can and do develop linearly. In development theories, all states are provided equal footing, but some states are “behind,” “backward,” or need to “catch up.”

WST arose largely out of Wallerstein’s contempt for modernization and development theories that espouse that economic processes operate the same way in all places. WST’s counter is that for every state’s or region’s development, another state or region experiences “underdevelopment.” Thus, WST’s main critique of such theories is that they are inherently deterministic and fail to take into consideration the context of the greater global economy.

The essence of WST is that since 1800 human interaction-political, economic, and social-has occurred within a global economy-the capitalist system. States are not the containers of human politics, and they are anything but equal. State interactions, as well as the interactions of numerous other political institutions occurring across a variety of geographic scales (i.e., the household, gender, class, race, nation, religion, and transnational institutions such as the United Nations), are all processes occurring within the capitalist world economy. The economy is the structure-everything else is ephemeral.

Among these institutions exist relationships between institutions of the “core” and “periphery.” Institutions belonging to the “core” produce high-value goods that can be traded for surplus to “peripheral” institutions producing cheaper, low value goods. This setup creates an inherently unequal system of trade, enlightening what Wallerstein sees as faults in modernization theory. The concept of core and periphery was not originally Wallerstein’s, but to these two classes Wallerstein adds the concept of the “semi-periphery.” Unlike other social theorists at the time, who largely argued that states and institutions were not mobile between core and periphery, Wallerstein argues that states can move between these positions, albeit rarely. Moreover, he argues that many states belong to the semi-periphery-they are exploited by core states but are often exploiters of peripheral states in the world economy.

Traditionally, most World Systems studies have utilized a quantitative approach. Wallerstein incorporated economic cycles into his theory and often used quantitative analysis of production, trade, and financial statistics to solidify his theory. However, in recent years, WST has increasingly incorporated qualitative analysis-particularly in the disciplines of geography and history.

WST and the Environment

WST has increasingly been used to analyze environmental issues by a variety of scientists across numerous disciplines. Arguing that capitalist processes have fended off the major 20th-century resistance to the capitalist system (i.e., global communism), several theorists are now hypothesizing that the capitalist system may be precipitating its own systemic decline through the ecological ruin resulting from its excesses. For example, World Systems theorists Andrew Jorgenson and Edward L. Kick argue that what is “lacking in the environmental literature … is a mature long-term historical approach” that only WST can provide.

WST, with its emphasis on core-periphery relationships, has been increasingly used to help explain the roots of environmental degradation. Increasingly, carbon emissions, fossil fuel efficiency, pollution control, and corporate production have been quantitatively analyzed within the capitalist world system context to help understand why peripheral states have continually seen an increase in environmental degradation. World Systems theorists argue that much environmentalist literature fails to see the whole picture-that is, environmental pollution is an outcome of the perpetual quest for more profit in the capitalist world-system, and that pollution affects peripheral states more than the core states due to their poor position within the capitalist economy.

WST rejects the widely accepted notion that “globalization” is characterized by distinct, interacting networks (e.g., political, economic, social, and cultural globalizations) that should be studied individually as additive pieces of a global process. Though the analysis of networks may be useful to distinguish between different types of globalization to better assess different impacts on the environment, WST researchers argue that any such case analysis must be brought back into the broader context of the world system.

As pertains to political and sociological theory, WST has largely passed its peak in academic reverence. Though still used by political geographers, sociologists, and historians, it has been harshly criticized by numerous academics of good repute. In recent decades, Wallerstein has increasingly moved away from analysis of the world-system to focus on philosophies of social science. However, the theory is increasingly being integrated and used as a lens for the analysis of environmental justice, particularly at the global scale. Articles dealing with the environment and capitalism regularly appear in the Journal of World-Systems Research and Review-the two flagship journals of world-systems research. Edited books using WST to analyze climate and greenhouse gases are a common occurrence as well.

Bibliography:

Giovanni Arrighi, The Long Twentieth Century (Verso, 1994);
David Harvey, “The World Systems Theory Trap,” Studies in Comparative International Development (v.22/1, 1987);
Andrew Jorgenson and Edward L. Kick, “Globalization and the Environment,” Journal of World-Systems Research (v.9/2, 2003);
Theda Skocpol, “Wallerstein’s World Capitalist System: A Theoretical and Historical Critique,” American Journal of Sociology (v.82/5, 2003);
Peter J. Taylor and Colin Flint, Political Geography: World-Economy, Nation-State, and Locality, 4th ed. (Prentice Hall, 2000);
Immanuel Wallerstein, The Modern World System: Capitalist Agriculture and the Origins of the European World-Economy in the Sixteenth Century (Academic Press, 1974);
Immanuel Wallerstein, “The Rise and Future Demise of the Capitalist World System: Concepts for Comparative Analysis,” Comparative Studies in Society and History (v.16, 1974);
Immanuel Wallerstein, Unthinking Social Science (Polity Press, 1991).