Thanks to Arno Tausch for mentioning Volker Bornschier's fine book,
_Western Society in Transition_ (Transaction Publishers 1996). Indeed
Bornschier's book is a fine study of the core countries that focusses
mainly on the period since World War II, though this is considered in
the context of the international system over the past several centuries.
It presents a theoretical approach to the world-system that overlaps
significantly with the "world polity" approach developed by John Meyer
and his colleagues (John Boli, Francisco Ramirez, George Thomas, etc.).
The emphasis is on changes in the global culture as institutionalized in
models of development espoused by the dominant actors. Bornschier
analyzes world-system cycles such as the Kondratieff wave and waves of
technological style as they have interacted with changes in the dominant
societal models, especially Keynsianism and its replacement by the
globalization project. This is a fine book that presents an alternative
way of looking at the modern world-system.
chris chase-dunn