Immanuel Wallerstein
American sociologist who developed the world-systems approach.
Immanuel Maurice Wallerstein (September 28, 1930 – August 31, 2019) was an American sociologist and economic historian. He is most recognized for creating the world-systems approach within sociology. From 2000 until his death in 2019, he served as a Senior Research Scholar at Yale University, and between October 1998 and July 2019, he wrote bimonthly syndicated commentaries on global affairs through Agence Global.
Born in New York to Jewish parents from Galicia (then part of Austria-Hungary)—Sara Günsberg (born 1897) and Menachem Lazar Wallerstein (born 1889)—his family emigrated from Galicia to the United States in 1921. His mother and older brother Solomon were listed as nationals of Austria-Hungary on the family’s immigration paperwork. Raised in a politically aware household, Wallerstein became interested in world events as a teenager. He earned all three of his degrees from Columbia University: a BA in 1951, an MA in 1954, and a PhD in 1959, with his primary doctoral advisor being C. Wright Mills, and Hans L. Zetterberg and Robert Staughton Lynd serving as readers. He also studied at Oxford University (1955–1956), the Université libre de Bruxelles, the Sorbonne, and the Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México. After serving in the U.S. Army from 1951 to 1953, he wrote a master’s thesis on McCarthyism as a feature of American political culture, which he later said confirmed his identity as a “political sociologist.” In 1964, he married Beatrice Friedman; their daughter Katharine Ellen was born two years later. He was also stepfather to Beatrice’s two children from a prior marriage, and the couple had five grandchildren.
Wallerstein’s academic career began at Columbia University, where he was an instructor and later associate professor of sociology from 1958 to 1971. He then taught at McGill University in Montreal from 1971 to 1976, before becoming a distinguished professor of sociology at SUNY Binghamton University from 1976 to 1999. In 1976, he was given the chance to lead a new research initiative, becoming head of the Fernand Braudel Center for the Study of Economies, Historical Systems and Civilization at Binghamton. The Center’s mission was to analyze large-scale social change over long historical periods, and it launched with the journal *Review*, which Wallerstein founded and edited. This work helped revitalize sociology and related fields like
- born
- September 28, 1930
- died
- August 31, 2019
- field
- Sociology, economic history
- nationality
- American
- known_for
- World-systems approach
Lore & Background
Wallerstein was born in New York to Jewish parents from Galicia (then part of Austria-Hungary) who had emigrated from Galicia to the United States in 1921. He earned all three degrees from Columbia University (BA 1951, MA 1954, PhD 1959), with his primary doctoral advisor being C. Wright Mills, and Hans L. Zetterberg and Robert Staughton Lynd as readers. He also studied at Oxford, the Université libre de Bruxelles, the Sorbonne, and the Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México. He served in the U.S. Army from 1951 to 1953 and wrote a master's thesis on McCarthyism. He married Beatrice Friedman in 1964 and had a daughter, Katharine Ellen Wallerstein, two years later.
His academic career began at Columbia University as instructor and associate professor (1958–1971), then at McGill University (1971–1976), and finally as distinguished professor of sociology at SUNY Binghamton University (1976–1999). In 1976 he became head of the Fernand Braudel Center for the Study of Economies, Historical Systems and Civilization at Binghamton, founding the journ
Reader's Guide
Wallerstein's significance lies in his development of the world-systems approach, which analyzes large-scale social change over long historical periods, drawing on Karl Marx, dependency theory, and the influences of Frantz Fanon, Fernand Braudel, and Ilya Prigogine. His most important work, The Modern World-System, appeared in four volumes between 1974 and 2011. He argued that the capitalist world economy is detrimental to a large proportion of the world's population and predicted its eventual replacement by a socialist economy, though he later concluded the successor system(s) is unknowable. He also argued that the United States is a 'hegemon in decline' and that the 1968 world revolution marked the end of liberalism as a viable ideology. His work invigorated sociology and its sister disciplines, especially history and political economy.
Did You Know?
- Wallerstein received the Gold Kondratieff Medal in 2004 from the International N. D. Kondratieff Foundation and the Russian Academy of Natural Sciences.
- He was the 13th president of the International Sociological Association, serving from 1994 to 1998.
- Wallerstein served in the U.S. Army from 1951 to 1953.
- He was stepfather to two children from his wife Beatrice's previous marriage.
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