Gunder Franks insists: I RISE TO A POINT OF PERSONAL PRIVILEDGE:I had NOT
made my=any posting yet. I was still composing it, while my friends posted
"comments" on it.
So now I HAVE POSTED IT TO WSN, but alas it contains NO comment on their
postings, which came TOO early = too late! perhaps i can reply to them
another time!!
On Sat, 26 Oct 1996, Thomas D. [Tom] Hall, THALL@DEPAUW.EDU wrote:
> Date: Sat, 26 Oct 1996 22:06:37 -0500 (EST)
> From: "Thomas D. [Tom] Hall, THALL@DEPAUW.EDU" <thall@DEPAUW.EDU>
> To: WORLD SYSTEMS NETWORK <wsn@csf.colorado.edu>
> Subject: On world-systems a la Al & Gunder
>
> TO: WSN
> FROM: Thomas D. Hall, THALL@DEPAUW.EDU
> RE: WST
> DATE: October 26, 1996
>
> Here are my first reactions to the recent posts by Al [Bergesen]
> & Gunder [Frank].
>
> As is typical for Al, he has pithly summarized a series of
> complex debates, and got the issues laid out pretty cleanly. His
> post is a good intro to the issues. Gunder, as is his wont, has
> many insights, and some important rethinking of the history of
> afroeurasia. However, he overstates his case.
>
> For those not in the debates Chris [Chase-Dunn] and I have been
> arguing with Gunder for some time now that there, indeed, have
> been significant transformations of in world-systems [for us,
> with the hyphen and with a plural s]. The two biggees are the
> appearance of tributary, state-based world-systems (which
> occurred several times in world history, independently) and one
> appearance of a capitalist-based world-system, which occurred
> only once, in the 17th century in western Europe. [This said
> with an appreciative nod to Sanderson's clever argument about
> capitalism in Japan]. Before going on about the disagreement
> regarding transitions, it is useful to sum up what we agree
> about.
>
> 1. That there has been an Afroeurasian world-system for at least
> 2000 years, possibly 3000 years. [In our view the evidence is
> shakey before about 2200 years ago[.
>
> 2. That the European 'peninsula of peninsulas' was a
> rump/tail/peripheral region in this larger system.
>
> 3. That the Afroeurasian world-system was multicentered, but
> with the heaviest center, or its center of gravity, in China for
> most of its history. [Again, the evidence gets shakey before
> about 2200 years ago].
>
> 4. That Europeans/peninsulars expanded outward, beginning in the
> late 1400s, to transform, and "underdevelop" [precisely in
> Gunder's sense of the development of underdevelopment"] much of
> the rest of the world.
>
> 5. That this process became truly global only after 1800, or
> possibly not until the beginning of the 20th century. [Just when
> it became global hinges on a number of definitional and
> measurement problems.] That is, clearly well after the long 16th
> century [1450-1640].
>
> 6. That beginning in late 18th or early 19th centuries, in
> England and spreading rapidly, new sorts of technology were
> developed and spread rapidly.
>
> There are probably a number of other agreements.
>
> Now to the differences, some of which are of the same order as
> that old song, about: "I say Toe-MAY-toe, I say Toh-maah-toh"...
> rather than say the differences between any world-
> system/dependency/marxian view and say that of Rostow:
>
> 1. There was a major reorganization of the world-system
> beginning the late 15th century as Europeans/peninsulars began to
> expand outward "discovering" the 'new world' and rounding the
> cape of Africa. [I must recall here a joke very popular in
> 'Indian Country': What did one Indian say to the other when
> Columbus landed? Well, there goes the neighborhood!]
>
> 2. This expansion unleashed vast and major transformations
> around the globe, especially in heretofore nonstate societies.
> An important point here, relative to Al's summary is that these
> transformations ramified far beyond the frontiers where Europeans
> encountered 'natives.' Thus, when many explorers first
> encountered other groups beyond the frontier they were NOT
> encountering ancestors, or ancestor-like peoples, but peoples
> vastly changed by the very processes that brought those observers
> to the place of observation WELL AFTER significant changes. This
> led to many distortions in our notions of social change. It has
> been a long term project of anthropologists and others to
> disentangle this observational morass [the best introductions to
> this are Eric Wolf's _Europe and the People without History_ and
> R. Brian Ferguson & Neil Whitehead's _War in the Tribal Zone_].
>
> 3. I [or better we, since Chris & I have collaborated so long on
> this] argue this expansion is a major change in the Afroeurasian
> world-system. Though not a transformation of the mode of
> accumulation, it is a significant change.
>
> 4. Only in the 17th century when the Dutch townmen (merchants
> and others) gain control of the state, do we have a situation in
> which capitalists control the state, and give birth to a
> capitalist world-system. This is not to deny the point argued at
> length by Sanderson (Social Transformations 1995) and Gunder that
> pockets of capitalism, capitalist enclaves, existed earlier, and
> widely--as far back as 5000 years ago as Gunder has argued.
> RATHER, our point is that these were precisely what we said,
> enclaves within tributary systems, not entire systems. Thus, the
> first capitalist SYSTEM occurs only in the 17th century.
>
> 5. Again, this is not to deny, that Japan [as Sanderson argues]
> might not have undergone a similar transformation within a
> century or two had not Europeans undergone it first. Our
> argument, which overlaps somewhat with Sanderson's, is that it
> was PRECISELY the noncore position of Europe (and similarly of
> Japan) that allowed this transformation.
>
> 6. Though there is disagreement about transformation here, a--to
> my mind--larger AGREEMENT should be underscored. This
> transformation [or in Gunder's argument intensification & change
> of center] can ONLY BE EXPLAINED by recognizing Europe's position
> within a much larger system. Not that all the internal (Weber,
> Brenner etc) arguments are wrong, but incomplete.
>
> 7. Out of this transformation emerged the industrial revolution
> and the vastly accelerated rate of social change that has
> engulfed the planet in the last 200 years or so. Again, the
> transformation/change/intensification can only be explained by
> recourse to the systemic position of Europe in the large world-
> system, now a truly global system.
>
> >From this, it is entirely plausible to argue/suggest as Gunder
> does that the center of this system may return to China in the
> not too distant future.
>
> Finally, I agree with Al & Gunder that an overly tight focus on
> Europe has led to a radical misunderstanding of how Europe rose
> to [temporary?] dominance. This misunderstanding has infected
> virtually all social science thinking and much of its research.
> Much needs to be rethought, remeasured, and reanalyzed. However,
> I disagree with Gunder that the findings Terry [Boswell] alludes
> to are not valid. The findings of world-sytem theory give us
> useful insights and understandings into how, and often why, the
> capitalist world-system functions as it has over the last two
> centuries or so. What the larger context does, is cause us to
> rethink what these findings might imply about the future.
>
> Much of what I have said here draws from _Rise & Demise:
> Comparing World-Systems_ (Chase-Dunn & Hall 1997) which should be
> published early next year. In that book we lay out our arguments
> in considerable detail, and spend much more time specifying
> definitions and theories.
>
> I hope this clarifies some of the issues, or at least makes clear
> which ones are not clear.
> tom hall
>