Here is the article to which Marc Gilbert refers. It appeared in Asian
Studies in America Issue 9, Fall 1997, pp. 5-7.
Below is the final submission which is only slightly different from the
published version. I am posting this with permission of Peter Hershock,
Asian Studies in America editor.
For a classical middle eastern discussion of the world-system analysis
the Jon Berquist article is quite good, and on line at the URL listed.
tom
Thomas D. [tom] Hall
thall@depauw.edu
Department of Sociology
DePauw University
100 Center Street
Greencastle, IN 46135
765-658-4519
HOME PAGE:
http://www.depauw.edu/~thall/hp1.htm
------------------------------
World-Systems Theory and Southeast Asia:
An Underdeveloped Encounter*
Thomas D. Hall
Lester M. Jones Professor of Sociology
DePauw University
thall@depauw.edu
http://www.depauw.edu/ thall/hp1.htm
* thanks to my colleague Marthe Chandler for helpful comments.
Analyses of Asia, based in a world-systems perspective are not
common. I hope to encourage students of Asia to consider this
perspective. I use the term "perspective," rather than theory
to emphasize that world-systems analysis represents a range of
theories and approaches which often compete and contradict
each other. These theories go far beyond those of the
perspective's founder, Immanuel Wallerstein. The major
contributions from this perspective have been to persuade
social scientists to contextualize their studies historically
and geopolitically. Because it is a "bookish" rather than
"article" enterprise a note can only hint at the nuanced
richness of these longer accounts.
I begin this note with a sketch of the world-system
perspective, then review some of its major works on Asia.
From there I turn to some topics in Southeast Asian history
where a world-systems perspective might be useful.
The World-System Perspective: A Thumbnail Sketch
A world-system is an intersocietal system marked by a self-
contained division of labor. Thus, it is a "world," in that
it is self-contained. Only in the twentieth century has it
become truly global. The "modern world-system" originated in
western Europe between 1450 and 1640. It has three
components: (1) a core which employs advanced industrial
production and distribution, has strong states, a strong
bourgeoisie, and a large working class; (2) a periphery which
specializes in raw materials production and has weak states, a
small bourgeoisie, and many peasants; and (3) a semiperiphery
which is intermediate between core and periphery, in its
economic, social, and political roles and its own internal
social structure. Core capitalists use various mechanism of
unequal exchange to extract capital from peripheral areas.
This promotes core development and peripheral impoverishment
simultaneously. Recently several scholars have been extending
world-system analysis into precapitalist [before 1500 CE]
settings, asking such questions as how and why did the
European, "modern world-system" arise?
A major premise of this perspective is that the world-
system must be studied as a whole. Therefore, the study of
social, political, economic, or cultural change in any
component of the system must begin by understanding that
component's role within the system, whether it be a nation,
state, region, ethnic group, class, gender role, or nonstate
society. This does not mean that the world-systems
perspective has all the answers. Only that any social
analysis is incomplete without attention to world-systemic
processes.
World-system theory is highly contentious, virtually
every statement in this summary is disputed. For additional
summaries and bibliography see Shannon (1996) or Hall (1996a,
1996b).
Asia in the World-System
One of the major world-system analyses of Asia was Frances
Moulder's Japan, China, and the Modern World Economy
(Cambridge 1977). While somewhat dated, and sometimes
challenged, it gives an overview of Asian development.
Somewhat more current is Alvin So and Stephen Chiu's East Asia
and the World-Economy (Sage 1995) which examines recent
divergences in economic and political development among Asian
states.
David A. Smith's Third World Cities in Global Perspective
(Westview 1996) argues for a combination of crossnational
statistical studies with detailed case studies in order to
understand the roles of local history and local actors in
world-systemic processes. The closing chapters of Giovanni
Arrighi's award winning The Long Twentieth Century (Verso
1994) also gives considerable attention to Asian development.
Andre Gunder Frank's forthcoming ReOrient: Global Economy in
the Asian Age (California) extends the perspective back for
millennia. He argues that the nineteenth and twentieth
century European domination of Asia was something of an
historical anomaly which has been profoundly misunderstood due
the deep eurocentrism of most social science and history.
Southeast Asia
One of the few world-system analyses of Southeast Asia is
Chris Dixon's Southeast Asia in the World-Economy (Cambridge
1991). Because of its regional emphasis, it does not provide
much depth on any one state. Other works like Nancy Peluso's
Rich Forests, Poor People (California 1992) address world-
system issues, although it is not rooted in this perspective.
Though a neophyte in Southeast Asia studies, several
areas seem to me ripe for fruitful study. First, an
examination of Southeast Asian history for the last two and
half millennia from a world-systems perspective offers
potential in exploring the cycles and spirals Michael Aung-
Thwin has noted (1991). Similary Jon Berquist's (1995)
concept of a contested periphery or semiperiphery may prove a
useful to understanding Southeast Asian history. A contested
periphery is a region torn and buffered between larger powers.
This geopolitical location both shapes historical processes
and allows local actors use to maintain some autonomy.
Similarly, I have been struck by the very close parallels in
Wolters's "mandala state" (1982) and world-systems analysis of
early state formation (Chase-Dunn and Hall 1997). Indeed, an
examination of ideological roots of the mandala state offers
an opportunity to rectify the world-systems perspective's
scant attention to ideology in general.
My own research on the American Southwest (1989) suggests
a potential fruitfulness in detailed comparisons between
Spanish colonialism in the Philippines and in Latin America.
Similarly, American attempts to control "tribal" peoples in
the Philippines drew heavily on experiences with Native
Americans. Indeed, the entire process of incorporation of
nonstate peoples by states throughout Southeast could usefully
be compared with similar processes elsewhere.
No doubt there are many other possibilities. For a
region marked by so much diversity--ethnic, racial, political,
social, and cultural--the world-systems perspective offers a
means of drawing useful, explicitly delineated, comparisons.
Equally important, the processes of social, economic,
political, and cultural change in Southeast Asia offer
opportunities for expanding, modifying, correcting, and
elaborating the world-systems perspective. To do so one does
not need to become a dyed-in-wool Wallersteinian or
"dependista," only to take intersocietal interactions and
history seriously--something almost all students of Asia and
Southeast Asia already do!
REFERENCES
Aung-Thwin, Michael. 1991. "Spirals in Early Southeast Asian
and Burmese History." Journal of Interdisciplinary
History 21:4(Spring)575-602.
Berquist, Jon L. 1995. "The Shifting Frontier: the
Achaemenid Empire's Treatment of Western Colonies."
Journal of World-Systems Research 1:17 [e-journal:
http://csf.colorado.edu/wsystems/jwsr.html]
Chase-Dunn, Christopher and Thomas D. Hall. 1997. Rise and
Demise: Comparing World-Systems. Boulder: Westview.
Hall, Thomas D. 1989. Social Change in the Southwest, 1350-
1880. Lawrence, KS: University Press of Kansas.
_____. 1996a. "World-Systems and Evolution: An Appraisal."
Journal of World-System Research, 2, No. 5 (1996): 1-109.
[e-journal: http://csf.colorado.edu/wsystems/jwsr.html]
_____. 1996b. "The World-System Perspective: A Small Sample
from a Large Universe." Sociological Inquiry
66:4(November):440-454.
Shannon, Thomas R. 1996. An Introduction to the World-System
Perspective, 2nd ed. Boulder: Westview Press.
Wolters, O. W. 1982. History, Culture, and Region in
Southeast Asian Perspectives. Singapore: Iseas.