The transformation of culture and society brought about by embracing a combination of new ways of thinking and new technology. A highly problematic concept in sociology and development studies, modernization theory assumes that all societies are on an evolutionary trajectory taking them from ‘primitive’ to ‘modern’ and that if they are not yet modern it is because they are reactionary and/or underdeveloped. This is problematic because it assumes that the western standard of living and lifestyle is the norm to which all societies should aspire; it also assumes that the western standard of living and lifestyle is implicitly the best available (in spite of the contrary evidence from environmental science). modernism is often thought of as a reaction to modernization, a means by which a particular society can absorb the shocks that rapid and radical change can cause. Modernization is also of interest to the *Annales School of historians---their research asks why modernization occurred in one place and not another. Further Reading: J. Timmons Roberts and A. Bellone Hite From Modernization to Globalization: Social Perspectives on International Development (1999).