Andre Gunder Frank and Barry K. Gills, eds. THE WORLD SYSTEM: FIVE HUNDRED YEARS OR FIVE THOUSAND? London and New York: Routledge, 1993. xxii + 320 pp. ISBN 0-415-7678-1, $65.00 (hardcover). Reviewed by Thomas D. Hall, Department of Sociology and Anthropology, DePauw University, Greencastle, Indiana, USA THE WORLD SYSTEM: FIVE HUNDRED YEARS OR FIVE THOUSAND? is an extended debate among the editors, Immanuel Wallerstein, Samir Amin, and others about how new and how different the modern, capitalist world-system is from all previous world-systems. Although Andre Gunder Frank and Barry Gills accept Wallerstein's analysis of the modern world-system, they strongly reject his claim for its novelty. Rather, they argue that many of the processes Wallerstein posits as unique to the modern world-system when the state were invented in Mesopotamia some five thousand years ago. They argue that the emphasis on the uniqueness of the modern world-system reproduces an unintended and unfortunate [Page 2] Eurocentrism. They argue instead for a humanocentric world history. Two further issues lurk in the background in the debate about European uniqueness. First, Frank and Gills argue that the assertion that there has been one continuous world system is not a reversion to a theory of unilineal, inevitable progress. Rather, it is a recognition of a deep historical continuity filled with contingencies amenable to human action. While they seek to avoid slipping into teleological reasoning and unilineal theorizing, and explicitly reject both, they always seem in imminent danger of going over the brink. Second, Frank and GillsŐ position continues to be contested, not only by Samir Amin and Immanuel Wallerstein, but by Christopher Chase-Dunn and myself and others. While Amin and Wallerstein argue that the appearance of the modern world-system was indeed something new under the sun, Chase-Dunn and I argue that its appearance was not the first such transformation. Gills and Frank side-step the issue of earlier transformations by [Page 3] starting with a major evolutionary problem already solved: the origin of states. We argue that the appearance of states was also a world-systemic process, and that the study of such major transformations -- from kin-based, normative to tributary, and from tributary to capitalist world-systems -- may offer insights into possible future transformations. This argument is largely ignored. To be fair, not much of it was in print at the time Frank and Gills edited their collection. While the debate over the uniqueness of the modern world- system continues, the level of disagreement should not be overstated. The differences are often ones of perspective, interpretation, and nuance. Frank and Gills emphasize continuity; others emphasize transformation. The book is organized in four parts. Part one is the editorsŐ opening essay--a masterful tour and plea for examining world history from a world-systemic view. It rehearses all the familiar, and many new, arguments for approaching history and social change from a world-system perspective. The second part develops their [Page 4] theory, beginning with a now classic essay on ancient imperialism by Kajsa Ekholm and Jonathan Friedman, followed by the editors' own theory of accumulation (the latter first appeared in Chase- Dunn and Hall, eds., CORE/PERIPHERY RELATIONS IN PRECAPITALIST WORLDS, 1991). This part concludes with a previously unpublished essay by Gills on hegemonic transitions. Gills provides a useful summary of conventional international relations theories and Gramscian theories of hegemony and compares both to their theory. He further claims that the cycles of hegemony and cycles of accumulation that characterize the five thousand year old world system are rooted in class struggles between elites and non-elites and among elites (p. 130). Part three analyzes world history, begining with a breathtaking tour of hegemonic shifts from "1700 BC to 1700 AD." They follow this with an analysis of feudalism, capitalism, and socialism as ideological modes. Part four opens with a new essay by political scientist David Wilkinson. This essay is a readable introduction to Wilkinson's important work which closely parallels [Page 5] that of Gills and Frank. In it he explains his concepts of central civilization, oikumenes, and civilizations. Next Samir Amin uses an analysis of tributary empires to makes a case for a sharp transformation to capitalism which draws on his EUROCENTRISM (1989). Janet Abu-Lughod summarizes and extends her analysis from BEFORE EUROPEAN HEGEMONY (1989) in a new essay, which observes both continuity and significant change in the appearance of modern capitalism. Immanuel Wallerstein presents a pungent four page critique of Frank and Gills' world system (no hyphen, singular) analysis, arguing for world-systems (hyphen, plural) analysis. This essay, in combination with the opening pages of the first essay draws the distinctions between the two approaches quite clearly. Gills and Frank exercise editorial prerogative and close with a rejoinder to their critics. A major insight in this collection is that the rise of Europe, and indeed the occurrence of feudalism, can only be explained by recourse to systemic connections to the rest of Afroeurasia. Debates of the uniqueness of Europe not withstanding, [Page 6] Frank and Gills agree with Amin that European feudalism originates in systemic processes, that it is a peripheral form of the tributary state. The major weaknesses, in my view, are: (1) lack of clear connection to and implication for future transformations, other than the claim that the struggle continues; (2) insufficient attention to demographic processes, especially epidemics transmitted along trade routes; and (3) only limited explanation of what drive the cycles of hegemony and accumulation that characterize this five thousand year old world system. Even the role of class struggles is not fully explicated. At least the questions are raised in a provocative way. This book bears the burden of any collection of previously published essays: it is redundant in places and disjointed in others. However, a Foreword by William H. McNeill, the Preface by the editors, addenda to a few essays, and parenthetical remarks noting links among the essays increase its overall coherence and minimize these minor faults. Even those who have read one, or even [Page 7] all, of the previously published essays will benefit from a new reading of the entire collection. Overall, THE WORLD SYSTEM: FIVE HUNDRED YEARS OR FIVE THOUSAND? belongs in every library that claims coverage of world history or international or relations. It is a "must read" for anyone seriously interested in the debates about precapitalist world-systems.