Wallerstein, Immanuel (1930—) American historian and sociologist, best known for the elaboration of the world-systems theory. His initial training was in the economic development of postcolonial Africa, but in the early 1970s he started to take a broader, more global view of economic development in recognition of the fact that the situation in Africa could not be accounted for satisfactorily without taking into account factors (such as international trade, information flows, strategic alliances, etc.) that are now associated with the process known as globalization. In Wallerstein’s view, globalization is merely an intensification of processes that have been around since the dawn of humanity, not a separate stage. This outlook in turn led to the development of his world-systems theory, for which he is best known. World-systems theory is perhaps better understood as a collection of theories, rather than a single theory, because it binds together a number of different ways of looking at the world. Wallerstein’s key insight is that it is the interrelations between nations that shape their fate and their future, not their efforts as individual states. Wallerstein’s historical analyses also show that geographical location has an enormous influence too---countries close to the centre of power (core) develop faster than those at the periphery. And though the core is not a constant---once it was Europe, now it is the US, and in the future it may be China---the importance of the relation between core and periphery is. It is a central factor in the economic growth of the global economy, as can be seen in the relation today between the US as consumer and retailer of manufactured goods made cheaply in China. The first instalment of his three-volume work The Modern World-System appeared in 1974, with the next two following in 1980 and 1989. Drawing on Marx, Karl’s conviction that the underlying economic factors have a determining effect on cultural and ideological matters, as well as Braudel, Fernand’s historical research on the creation of economic networks, Wallerstein offered a revised form of dependency theory as a riposte to the then fashionable Three Worlds model of the global economy. He argued that economically and historically there is only one world, consisting of very complex networks of relations. He overlays this model with a distinction between core and periphery, arguing that it is the movement between the two that functions as the true ‘motor’ of history. Consistent with his own economic theory, Wallerstein predicts the end of America’s reign as the ‘lone superpower’ in The Decline of American Power (2003), a book written on the eve of the invasion of Iraq. Obviously it is too soon to tell if that prediction will prove accurate, but it shows a perhaps utopia conviction that the future must be different from the present.