Hostname: page-component-586b7cd67f-gb8f7 Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-11-23T04:04:55.625Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false

Modernization Theory and the Formation of Modern Social Theories in England and America

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  03 June 2009

Joyce Appleby
Affiliation:
San Diego State University

Extract

‘Modernization theory’, Alexander Gerschenkron remarked recently, ‘obstructs rather than promotes the understanding of processes of econo- mic change’. Far from being a startling judgement, Gerschenkron's comment only signals that another distinguished scholar has joined the theory's detractors. The marked failure of modernization theory to predict how less developed countries would react to incentives for material advance explains the growing chorus of criticism. This indeterminate response from third world peoples has quite properly raised doubts about how well we understand what is involved in the reorientation of a society's habitual practices. The blight of disconfirming evidence, according to E. I. Eisenstadt, has now led to the abandonment of hope that breakdowns in modernization would be followed by resurgences towards modernity.

Type
Varieties of Modernization
Copyright
Copyright © Society for the Comparative Study of Society and History 1978

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

I wish to thank Jonathan Dewald and Jeffrey Barnouw for their criticisms of this essay in an earlier form.

1 Gerschenkron, Alexander, ‘Europecentrism and Other Horrors: A Review Article’, Comparative Studies in Society and History, 19, (1977), 111.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

2 Eisenstadt, E. I., ‘Studies of Modernization and Sociological Theory’, History and Theory, 13 (1974), 235–41.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

3 Smith, Anthony D., The Concept of Social Change: A Critique of the Functionalist Theory of Social Change (London, 1973), pp. 1415, 68–77Google Scholar; and Tipps, Dean C., ‘Modernization Theory and the Comparative Study of Societies: A Critical Perspective’, Comparative Studies in Society and History, 15 (1973), 202–04.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

4 Smith, , Concept of Social Change, p. 66Google Scholar. See also Nisbet, Robert A., Social Change and History: Aspects of the Western Theory of Development (New York, 1969), pp. 240Google Scholar ff; and Wiener, Jonathan M.. ‘Modernization Theory and History; Achievement and Limitations’, paper delivered at the Social Science History Association Meeting, Madison, Wisconsin, April 23, 1976.Google Scholar

5 Durkheim, Emile, The Rules of Sociological Method, George Catlin, E. G., ed. (New York, 1964), pp. 113Google Scholar. See also Giddens, Anthony, ‘Classical Social Theory and the Origins of Modern Sociology’, American Journal of Sociology, 81 (1976). 703–21.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

6 Brown, Richard D., ‘Modernization and the Modern Personality in Early America, 1600–1865: A Sketch of a Synthesis’, Journal of Interdisciplinary History, 2 (1972), 201–02CrossRefGoogle Scholar; and Stout, Harry S., ‘Culture, Structure, and the “New” History: A Critique and an Agenda’, Computers and the Humanities, 9 (1975), 213–30.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

7 Parsons, Talcott, The Structure of Social Action (New York, 1937), p. 768.Google Scholar

8 Geertz, Clifford, ‘Ideology as a Cultural System’ in Apter, David E., ed., Ideology and Discontent (Glencoe, 111., 1964), p. 64.Google Scholar

9 Ibid.; Lichtheim, George, The Concept of Ideology’, History and Theory, 4 (1964), 164–95.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

10 Birnbaum, Norman, ‘The Sociological Study of Ideology’, Current Sociology, 9 (1960), 91.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

11 Bailyn, Bernard, ‘The Central Themes of the American Revolution: An Interpretation’, in Kurtz, Stephen G. and Hutson, James H., eds., Essays on the American Revolution (Chapel Hill, 1973), p. 11.Google Scholar

12 The Commonwealth of Oceana in Pocock, J. G. A., ed., The Political Works of James Harrington (Cambridge, 1977), pp. 197–98Google Scholar. For a fine exploration of this development, see Fox-Genovese, Elizabeth, ‘Psychohistory versus Psychodeterminism: the Case of Rogin's Jackson’, Reviews in American History, 3 (1975), 407–18.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

13 [Powell, Robert], Depopulation arraigned (London, 1636), p. 111.Google Scholar

14 Supple, Barry, Commercial Crisis and Change in England, 1600–1642 (Cambridge, 1959), p. 235.Google Scholar

15 Cooper, J. P., ‘Social and Economic Policies under the Commonwealth’, in Aylmer, G. E., ed., The Interregnum (London, 1972), pp. 121–42.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

16 Brenner, Robert, ‘The Social Basis of English Commercial Expansion, 1550–1650’, Journal of Economic History, 32 (1972), 361–84.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

11 On these developments see Wrigley, E. A., ‘A Simple Model of London's Importance in Changing English Society and Economy 1650–1750’, Past and Present, 37 (1967), 4470CrossRefGoogle Scholar; and my Economic Thought in Seventeenth-Century England (Princeton, 1978), pp. 158–98.Google Scholar

18 Hoskins, W. G., ‘Harvest Fluctuations and English Economic History, 1620–1759’, Agricultural History Review, 16 (1968), 1531, esp. 21.Google Scholar

19 Walter, John and Wrightson, Keith, ‘Dearth and the Social Order in Early Modern England’, Past and Present, 71 (1976), 2242.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

20 Thompson, F. M. L., ‘Landownership and Economic Growth in England in the Eighteenth Century’, in Jones, E. L. and Woolf, S. J., eds., Agrarian Change and Economic Development (London, 1969)Google Scholar; and Kerridge, Eric, Agrarian Problems in the Sixteenth Century and After (London, 1969) pp. 124–25.Google Scholar

21 Everitt, Alan, lsquo;Farm Labourers’, in Thirsk, Joan, ed.. The Agrarian History of England and Wales, 1500–1640 (Cambridge, 1967).Google Scholar

22 Cook, John, Unum necessarium (London, 1648), p. 7.Google Scholar

23 [SirNorth, Dudley], Discourses upon trade (London, 1691), p. viiiGoogle Scholar. Letwin, William, ‘The Authorship of Sir Dudley North's Discourses on Trade’, Economica, 18 (1951), 3545, suggests that Roger North wrote the preface to his brother's essay.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

24 [Barbon, Nicholas], An apology for the builder (London, 1685), pp. 3233.Google Scholar

25 Mun, Thomas, England's treasure by forraign trade (London, 1664), pp. 218–19.Google Scholar

26 Interest of money mistaken (London, 1668), pp. 2123.Google Scholar

27 Coke, Roger, England's improvements (London, 1675), p. 57.Google Scholar

28 Davenant, Charles, ‘A Memorial Concerning the Coyn of England’ [1695], in Usher, Abbott Payson, ed., Two Manuscripts by Charles Davenant (Baltimore, 1942), pp. 2021.Google Scholar

29 SirPetty, William, A treatise of taxes (London, 1662), p. 33.Google Scholar

30 [Locke, John], Some considerations of the consequences of the lowering of interest (London, 1692), pp. 12.Google Scholar

31 Sir Thomas Colepepers Tracts concerning Usury Reprinted … with some animadversions on the writings of Dr. Lock (London [1709]).Google Scholar

32 [Houghton, John], A collection of letters for the improvement of husbandry and trade (London, 1681–83), p. 60.Google Scholar

33 Lee, Joseph, A vindication of a regulated enclosure (London, 1656), p. 9.Google Scholar

34 [North], Discourses upon trade, p. viii.Google Scholar

35 [Briscoe, John], A discourse of money (London, 1696), p. 22.Google Scholar

36 Discourse of the nature, use and advantages of trade (London, 1693), pp. 812.Google Scholar

37 [Barbon, ], An apology for the builder, pp. 3233.Google Scholar

38 [Martyn, Henry], Considerations upon the East-India trade (London, 1701), p. 67.Google Scholar

39 [North], Discourses upon trade, p. 14.Google Scholar

40 [SirThomas, Dalby], An historical account of the West-India Collonies (London, 1690), p. 6.Google Scholar

41 [Sheridan, Thomas], A discourse of the rise and power of Parliaments ([London] 1677), p. 225.Google Scholar

42 Adiscourse of the nature, use and advantages of trade, p. 15.Google Scholar

43 [North], Discourses upon trade, p. viii.Google Scholar

44 Thomas, P. J., Mercantilism and the East India Trade (London, 1963), pp. 30, 51.Google Scholar

45 A scheme of trade as it is at present carried on between England and France [London, 1674]Google Scholar. On this see Margaret Priestley, ‘Anglo-French Trade and the “Unfavourable Balance” Controversy, 1660–1685’ Economic History Review, second series, 4 (19511952).Google Scholar

46 The great necessity and advantage of preserving our own manufacturies (London, 1697)Google Scholar; The great loss and damage to England by the transportation of wooll to forreign parts (n.p., 1677); and Reasons humbly offered for the passing of a bill (London, 1697).Google Scholar

47 On these shifts of economic orientation see Clark, G. N., Guide to English Commercial Statistics (London, 1938), pp. xiii–xivGoogle Scholar; Davis, Ralph, ‘England's Foreign Trade, 1700–1774’, Economic History Review, second series, 15 (1962), 295303Google Scholar; and Thomas, , Mercantilism and the East India Trade, pp. 172–73.Google Scholar

48 Price, Jacob, ‘Multilateralism and/or Bilateralism: the settlement of British Trade Balances with the North, c. 1700’, Economic History Review, second series, 14 (1961), 254–74Google Scholar; and Sperling, J., ‘The International Payments Mechanism in the Seventeenth and Eighteenth Centuries’, Economic History Review, second series, 14 (1961), 446–68.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

49 Jones, D. W., ‘London Merchants and the Crisis of the 1690s’, in Clark, Peter and Slack, Paul, eds., Crisis and Order in English Towns 1500–1600 (London, 1972), pp. 333–38.Google Scholar

50 Dickson, P. G. M., The Financial Revolution in England (New York, 1967), pp. 617Google Scholar; and Davis, Ralph, ‘The Rise of Protection in England, 1689–1786’, Economic History Review, second series, 19 (1966), 306–17.Google Scholar

51 Dickson, Financial Revolution, pp. 822Google Scholar; and Laslett, Peter, ‘John Locke, the Great Recoinage, and the Origins of the Board of Trade’, William and Mary Quarterly, 14 (1957), 370402.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

52 Jones, , ‘London Merchants and the Crisis of the 1690s’, pp. 338–43Google Scholar; and Dickson, , Financial Revolution, pp. 257–59.Google Scholar

53 Davis, , ‘Rise of Protection’, 313–17.Google Scholar

54 Coleman, D. C., ‘Politics and Economics in the Age of Anne: the Case of the AngloFrench Trade Treaty of 1713’, in Coleman, and John, A. H., eds., Trade, Government and Economy in Preindustrial England: Essays Presented to F. J. Fisher (London, 1976).Google Scholar

55 Plumb, J. H., ‘The Growth of the Electorate in England from 1600 to 1712’, Past and Present, 45 (1969), 90116.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

56 Western, J. R., Monarchy and Revolution: the English State in the 1680s (London, 1972), p. 3.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

57 [Locke, ], Some considerations, pp. 1617.Google Scholar

58 On this see Ashley, William James, ‘The Tory Origin of Free Trade Policy’, in Surveys, Historic and Economic (London, 1900), pp. 295–99.Google Scholar

59 Houghton, , A collection of letters, pp. 4349.Google Scholar

60 Skinner, Quentin, ‘History and Ideology in the English Revolution’, Historical Journal, 8 (1965), 151–78.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

61 Davis, , ‘England's Foreign Trade, 17001774.Google Scholar

62 Curtin, Philip, The Atlantic Slave Trade (Madison, 1969), pp. 140, 216.Google Scholar

63 Price, Jacob, ‘The Economic Growth of the Chesapeake and the European Market, 1695–1775’, Journal of Economic History, 24 (1964), 496516.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

64 Earle, Carville and Hoffman, Ronald, ‘Staple Crops and Urban Development in the Eighteenth-century South’, Perspectives in American History, 10 (1976), 34.Google Scholar

65 Paine, Thomas, Common Sense, The Works of Thomas Paine (London, 1796), p. 12.Google Scholar

66 Egnal, Marc, ‘The Economic Development of the Thirteen Continental Colonies, 1720 to 1775’, William and Mary Quarterly, 32 (1975), 191222CrossRefGoogle Scholar. See also McCusker, John J., ‘Sources of Investment Capital in the Colonial Philadelphia Shipping Industry’, Journal of Economic History 12 (1972), 146–57.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

67 Harris, P. M. G., ‘The Social Origins of American Leaders: The Demographic Foundations’, Perspectives in American History, 3 (1969), 234–36.Google Scholar

68 Nash, Gary B., ‘Slaves and Slaveowners in Colonial Philadelphia’, William and Mary Quarterly, 30 (1973), 227–28.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

69 Earle, and Hoffman, , ‘Staple Crops and Urban Development’, p. 56Google Scholar; and Mitchell, Robert D., ‘The Shenandoah Valley Frontier’, Annals of the Association of American Geographers, 62 (1972).CrossRefGoogle Scholar

70 Williams, David Allen, ‘The Small Farmer in Eighteenth-century Virginia Politics’, Agricultural History, 43 (1969), 93Google Scholar; and Lemon, James, The Best Poor Man's Country: A Geographical Study of Early Southeastern Pennsylvania (Baltimore, 1972), p. 94.Google Scholar

71 Lester, Richard A., ‘Currency Issues to Overcome Depressions in Pennsylvania, 1723 and 1729’, Journal of Political Economy, 45 (1938), 324CrossRefGoogle Scholar

72 Nash, Gary, ‘The Transformation of Urban Politics, 1700–1765’, Journal of American History, 60 (1973), 605–32.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

73 [Wise, John], ‘A Word of Comfort to a Melancholy Country’, and [Benjamin Franklin], ‘A Modest Enquiry into the Nature and Necessity of a Paper Currency’, in Davis, A. M., ed., Colonial Currency Reprints, 1682–1751 (Boston, 1911), vol. 2, p. 186.Google Scholar

74 Cook, Edward M., Jr., ‘Social Behavior and Changing Values in Dedham, Massachusetts, 1700 to 1775’, William and Mary Quarterly, 27 (1970), 578CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Bushman, Richard, From Puritan to Yankee: Character and the Social Order in Connecticut, 1690–1765 (New York, 1970), pp. 276–77Google Scholar; and McAnear, Beverly, ‘Mr. Robert R. Livingston's Reasons Against a Land Tax’, Journal of Political Economy, 48 (1940), 73.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

75 [Stevens, Thomas], ‘A Brief Account of the Causes that have Retarded the Progress of the Colony of Georgia in America’, in Collection of the Georgia Historical Society, 2 (1892).Google Scholar

76 Crowley, J. E., This Sheba, Self: The Conceptualization of Economic Life in Eighteenth-Century America (Baltimore, 1974), pp. 76127.Google Scholar

77 Warden, G. B., ‘The Distribution of Property in Boston, 1692–1775’, Perspectives in American History, 10 (1976), 111.Google Scholar

78 Ibid., p. 97. See also Morgan, Edmund, ‘The Puritan Ethic and the American Revolution’, William and Mary Quarterly, 24 (1967), 343CrossRefGoogle Scholar; and Woodward, C. Vann, ‘The Southern Ethic in a Puritan World’, William and Mary Quarterly, 25 (1968), 343–70.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

79 Chaffin, Robert J., ‘The Townshend Act of 1767’, William and Mary Quarterly, 27 (1970), 90 121CrossRefGoogle Scholar; and on this point see Rakove, Jack N.. ‘The Decision for American Independence: A Reconstruction’, Perspectives in American History, 10 (1976), 217 75, especially 274 75.Google Scholar

80 On this point see Upton, L. F. S., ‘The Dilemma of the Loyalists Pamphleteers’, Studies in Burke and His Time, 18 (1977)Google Scholar; and Dickinson, H. T., ‘The Eighteenth-Century Debate on the Sovereignty of Parliament’, Royal Historical Society Transactions, 5th series, 26 (1976).CrossRefGoogle Scholar

81 For a summary of his position, see Bailyn, , ‘Central Themes of the American Revolution.’ Pertinent here is Pauline Maier, ‘Why Revolution? Why Democracy?’, Journal of Interdisciplinary History, 6 (1976), 715.Google Scholar

82 Countryman, Edward, ‘Out of the Bounds of the Law: Northern Land Rioters in the Eighteenth Century’, in Young, Alfred, ed.. The American Revolution: Explorations in the History of American Radicalism (De Kalb, 1976), p. 48Google Scholar; and Boucher, Jonathan, A View of the Causes and Consequences of the American Revolution (1779).Google Scholar

83 [Briscoe, ], A discourse of money, p. 136.Google Scholar

84 Friedman, Bernard, ‘The Shaping of Radical Consciousness in Provincial New York’, Journal of American History, 56 (1970), 789, 792.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

85 Pole, J. R., ‘Review of Merrill Jensen, The American Revolution Within America, William and Mary Quarterly, 33 (1976), 157CrossRefGoogle Scholar. See also Foner, Eric, ‘Tom Paine's Republic: Radical Ideology and Social Change.’ in Young, ed., American Revolution, pp. 200 ff.Google Scholar