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Leonid Grinin
Volgograd Center for Social Research The paper discusses the following issues: the correlation between technological development, globalization, and political organization; and the correlation between urbanization and political development. I also try to connect the process of historical globalization with the phases of expanding spatial links between societies. Thus, in the process of expansion of interacting networks we point out seven levels: from local level trough the level of transcontinental links to the planetary one. Actually, one can speak about the historical globalization starting from the phase when the regional links originated. This period from the second half of the fourth millennium BC to the first half of the first millennium BCE virtually triggered the historical globalization. In the presentation I aim at revealing the important correlations between different variables. I point out that the most significant changes within the Afroeurasian world system and globalization were definitely associated with crucial technological breakthroughs or production revolutions, namely, Agrarian, Industrial, and Cybernetic. Urbanization was tightly connected with technological and political transformations. The Urban Revolution in the fourth millennium BCE can be regarded as a multi-dimensional phase transition of the Afroeurasian world-system to a qualitatively new level of complexity. However, the very possibility of the Urban Revolution was undoubtedly provided by the concluding stage of the Agrarian Revolution in the South Mesopotamia and resulting demographic changes. It also appears necessary to note that the ‘urban’ pattern of the early state formation was one of the most wide-spread. I also analyze a close correlation between urbanization and political integration. The paper defines three main transitions in the growth of world urbanization and three stage of development of statehood. On the whole, during the period of historical globalization one can observe a close correlation between such important processes as technological transformations, spatial expansion of contact area, urbanization, political integration, and struggle for political hegemony.
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