A Comparative Study Of Marx's World History Thought And Wallerstein's World System Theory

Although Marx and Wallerstein are people of different eras,their world historical thoughts and world system theory formed by the Institute of Capitalist Social Development have a wide impact on the world today.The idea of world history is a worldwide vision of Marx's observation and analysis of capitalist society.It reveals in a whole how the history of mankind moves from national history to the world history of capitalism and finally to the inevitability and regularity of the history of communist world.Wallerstein focuses on the overall structural analysis of the history of contemporary capitalist world.Starting from structuralism,he combined Marx's view of world history to explain the composition and development of the capitalist world system,and gradually made the world system theory a new Marxist theory with unique thinking qualities.The thesis mainly analyzes the connotation,development motivation,development cycle and development trend of world history and world system.Both Marx and Wallerstein take the development of capitalist society as the research object,and pay great attention to the overall grasp of the development of capitalist society,but they have different understandings of the formulation and composition of the history of capitalist society.Marx analyzes the development of capitalist society from the perspective of the formation of capitalist world history,and combines unity and diversity to analyze the formation and connotation of world history.Wallerstein mainly analyzes the world system as a basic unit,constructs his concept of the world system from both economic and political levels,and focuses on the analysis of the development of modern capitalist society from the interconnectedness of the state.Both Marx and Wallerstein believe that the mode of production is the driving force for the development of capitalist society,but Marx focuses on the role of productivity and communication,and Wallerstein pays more attention to the analysis of the division of labor and the role of capital accumulation.Both Marx and Wallerstein believe that the development of capitalism is cyclical.Marx is explaining the periodicity of capitalist social and economic development from the economic crisis.Wallerstein advocates explaining the capitalist economic cycle from political and economic processes.Both Marx and Wallerstein predicted the ultimate demise of capitalist society,but Marx firmly believed that capitalist society would move toward a communist society,while Wallerstein believed that the future direction of world development was unpredictable.Through comparative research,we can clearly see that Wallerstein's theory of world system is undoubtedly influenced by Marx's world historical thoughts,but at the same time it has developed and deepened Marx's world historical thoughts.This influence and deepening will not only help us deepen.The understanding of Marx's world historical thoughts is also conducive to deepening our understanding of the essence and trends of contemporary capitalism and providing reference and enlightenment for China's socialist construction.Of course,Wallerstein's theory of world system is not a direct inheritance of Marx's world historical thoughts.They have fundamental differences in their starting points and positions.Moreover,the limitations of economic determinism,Eurocentrism,and pessimism in the world system theory itself are worthy of our reflection.