Immanuel Wallerstein

Researcher & Scientist

About Immanuel Wallerstein

Immanuel Wallerstein (1930–2019) was a renowned American sociologist and historian, best known for his development of world-systems theory. Wallerstein’s academic work focused on the historical development of global capitalism, arguing that the modern world-system emerged in the 16th century and was characterized by a division between the core, periphery, and semi-periphery countries. His influential multi-volume work, The Modern World-System, redefined how scholars understood global history, economics, and political power, emphasizing that nations do not operate in isolation but are part of an interconnected system where wealth and power are unevenly distributed.

Wallerstein’s ideas extended beyond academia, shaping discussions on globalization, social justice, and geopolitics. He critiqued the traditional capitalist system for perpetuating inequalities and predicted its eventual decline due to its inherent contradictions. A scholar with wide-ranging interests, Wallerstein was influenced by Marxism, but his work also incorporated insights from a range of disciplines, including economics, political science, and anthropology. His contributions have left a lasting impact on the fields of sociology, political economy, and international relations.

His Books

The Modern World-System III: The Second Era of Great Expansion of the Capitalist World-Economy, 1730s-1840s

The Modern World-System Volume IV

European Universalism: The Rhetoric of Power

Africa, The Politics of Independence and Unity

Want to see the full book list? Check the book archive.

We can tentatively credit capitalist civilization with a positive, if very geographically uneven, record in the struggle against disease.”

Commentaries

My first commentary appeared on October 1, 1998. It was published by the Fernand Braudel Center (FBC) at Binghamton University. I have [...]
U.S. superdiplomat Henry Kissinger is famously said to have asked, “Who do I call if I call Europe?” The question is repeatedly [...]
Two leading actors in the modern world systems – Donald Trump and Theresa May of England – sound like broken records. They [...]
We all want to know what the future portends for us about anything important. We all tend to believe the future will [...]
On April 15, 2019, a fire at the Cathedral of Notre Dame was a tragedy for people all across the world, and [...]
Epistemology, especially statistics, is the study of how we measure things and how we know if our measurements are correct. Ontology is [...]