Re: Wallerstein's response to O'Brien

Wallerstein starts his response saying he will not contest "the 
particular numbers O'Brien has calculated", except to remind the reader 
that, in O'Brien's own words,  the existing stats on these matters are 
"scarce and shaky". My view is that, while the data themselves can be the 
matter of  debate, these are some of the best *available* 
calculations, more systematic and precise than Wallerstein's own,  
scanty, data.

>From here W's moves to other objections, the only serious one 
being "suppose it is true that the contribution of trade between 
England and the periphery (as defined by O'Brien) to investment is 
only 7%. What are we supposed to infer - that England could have 
developed more or less as it did without the benefit of the 7%? 
Suppose that the trade with Wales accounts for another 7%, with 
Scotland still another, and then 7% with Cornwall. Where are we to 
stop this hypothetical 'chopping off'". Some may wonder, what the hell 
W is doing mentioning regions inside Britain? Well, because he also 
thinks that O'Brien wongly defined the periphery as including Asia, 
Africa, and the Americas, when he had in fact excluded, in his book 
on the long sixteenth century, Asia and Africa, but included Iberian  
America, eastern and 'southern' Europe. Even more, W adds that 
peripheries are not "geographical terms" but "processes that are 
relational". In this sense, W writes, "England developed as it did 
because of the totality of what historically occurred" - apparently 
because of the "totality" of  relational processes *of exploitation* that included 
more than O'Brien's own definition of the periphery. So, "we do 
not need to show that the periphery's hypothetical 7% was 
'decisive'...We only need to presume that the 7% was there because, 
without it, profits overall would have been less and therefore the 
accumulation of capital would have slowed down."  

O'Brien's reply is right to the point. Indicating that he had noted 
in his article some of the difficulties surrounding the exact geographical 
boundaries of the periphery, he questions, as others have, W's 
definition of the periphery which "excludes Asia, Africa...but 
embraces peripheral zones located inside of core states". But, more 
importantly, he criticizes W's attempt to escape a geographical 
definition for one which emphasises "processes that are relational", 
as an attempt to include in that definition anyone - i.e., social groups 
within core countries themselves - who is in some 
sense exploited  in the process of accumulation - in which case 
"peripheries may be located anywhere". So much for the scientific 
status of ws concepts like  periphery and core.