3. The Interwar Hiatus and the Rise of Development/Modernization Theory

Despite the fact that some of the works referred to in the preceding section were written in the period between World War I and World War II, that period must be regarded as a barren one from the standpoint of social change theory. The two most notable contributions of the period were those of Kroeber (1944) and Sorokin (1937). Both of these theories had to do with the rise and fall of whole civilizations and both were "emanationist" in the sense that social and cultural change was regarded as the unfolding of possibilities contained in fundamental cultural premises or assumptions. The causes for the relative stagnation of interest in development and change are no doubt complex, but certainly among them are the fact that much of American social science was preoccupied with the short-term crises of economic depression and war and much of European social science was brought to a standstill, if not destroyed by the crises by economic depression, fascism, and war.

In the 1950s the social sciences witnessed a great birth of interest in the subjects of growth, development, and modernization, and much of this interest focused on societies that were referred to as "underdeveloped," "developing," or simply "new." Among economists there was a surge of interest in "growth economics." Sociologists theorized about the distinctive institutional characteristics of modernity. Political scientists expanded their comparative sights and included kinship, tribal arrangements, communities, and other "premodern" political arrangements in their scope of interest. Although development/modernization theory has been characterized as a coherent entity by subsequent critics, it was in fact quite diverse with respect to its identification of what is distinctively modern, what mechanisms make for modernization, and what the obstacles to modernization are.

One variant of modernization theory involved a kind of resuscitation of the Gemeinschaft-Gesellschaft distinction (or related distinctions, such as Weber's traditional-modern, Durkheim's mechanical-organic, or Redfield's folk-urban), which was then used to characterize the modernization process. Some (Hoselitz 1960; Levy 1966) made extensive use of Parsons's pattern-variables and regarded the essence of modernization as the displacement of ascriptive standards by achievement standards, particularistic ties by universalistic ones, and diffuse and inclusive personal personal relationships by more functionally specific ones, and so on. Parsons himself (1971) made some use of these distinctions in his writings on development,

but in the end the concept that played the most central role for him was the idea of structural differentiation—between the family and the workplace, between religion and the state, between the polity and the economy—as the hallmark of development (Parsons 1961). Subsequently, Parsons generalized his views of change into a neoevolutionary scheme that regarded evolution as adaptive upgrading through economic growth, structural differentiation, the inclusion of diverse social groups and classes, and the generalization of values (1971).

The modernization literature yielded a kind of composite picture of what is involved in the process: Traditional religious systems tend to lose influence. Often powerful nonreligious ideologies, such as nationalism, arise. Traditional privileges and authority become less important and the basis of the class system shifts to personal achievement and merit. The family ceases to be the main unit of economic production. Extended family and kin groups break into smaller units. Personal choice, not the dictates of parents, becomes the basis for courtship and marriage. In education the literacy rate increases greatly and formal educational institutions develop at all levels. At the same time, the mass media serve as a vast educational resource and information channel. Informal customs and mores decay as new techniques of social control and systems of formal law arise. New forms of political organization (for example, political parties) and more complex systems of administration develop. Some scholars made the theoretical and empirical case that there is such a thing as a "modern man," who is created by institutions such as the factory and the school.

[The modern man] is an informed participant citizen; he has a marked sense of personal efficacy; he is highly independent and autonomous in his relations to traditional sources of influence, especially when he is making basic decisions about how to conduct his personal affairs; he is ready for new experiences and ideas, that is, he is relatively open-minded and cognitively flexible. (Inkeles and Smith 1974, 290)

Modernization theorists also identified obstacles to the process, mainly in the traditional religious, communal, and kinship forms. Moore, for example, argued that the kinship system in nonindustrial societies "perhaps … offers the most important single impediment to individual mobility, not only through the competing claims of kinsmen upon the potential industrial recruit but also through the security offered in established patterns of mutual responsibility" (1951, 24).

One interesting variant of the growth literature of the 1950s was the psychological theory of entrepreneurs. Many observers regarded the entrepreneur as the major driving force of development. McClelland (1961), building on Weber's theory of the Protestant ethic, suggested that

the key motivation of entrepreneurs is a need for achievement, which involves an interest in exercising skill in medium-risk situations and a desire for concrete signs of successful performance. This need, moreover, develops in the period of early socialization, when the child is exposed to self-reliance training and high standards of performance. McClelland also argued that the combination of a loving mother with a nondominant father was important in fostering the need for achievement. Although it also relies on child-rearing patterns and motivation, the theory of Hagen (1962) is more complicated than McClelland's. Hagen argued that stable traditional societies generally employ authoritarian child-rearing practices that develop passive noninnovative personality types. When such societies are shaken by external disturbance (such as colonial domination), the first response is a kind of "retreatism" that manifests itself in the family as a decline of the father's status and an enhancement of the mother's status. This in turn "frees" the son from a repressive father in the subsequent generation and releases creative and innovative energies in the economy.

In the 1960s and the 1970s modernization theory was subjected to a vast array of specific and general criticisms. I list only those that have the most direct relevance for the themes of this chapter:

1.     Many observers argued that modernization theory is Western-centric and erroneously regards development as a process whereby developing societies will converge toward a common model. Certainly some of the statements and analyses of functionalist theories can be characterized in this way. Lerner, for example, defined modernization simply as "the process of social change whereby less developed societies acquire characteristics common to more developed societies" (1985, 386). The work of Kerr et al. (1960) on industrial relations systems argued that a number of historically distinct patterns were evolving toward a common one, despite the persistence of ideological and political differences among nations. Goode (1963) argued that, despite vast cultural differences in kinship, the modernization process—mainly industrialization and urbanization—pressed heretofore diverse family structures in the direction of the conjugal type and made for a narrowing of national differences in family-related behavior, such as divorce rates.

     Gusfield (1967) was one of the most forceful critics of the modernization perspective. He challenged statements found in the modernization literature that traditional societies are static and unchanging; he pointed to the heterogeneity of different traditional forms. Most important, he argued that the old and the new are not always in conflict. He argued that modern institutions do not simply replace

     traditional ones; often the two types reinforce each other. He stressed the blends and compromise that different cultures achieve in processes of development. His critique echoes the "historicist" elements of Weber's earlier polemic against classical evolutionary theory. Bendix, also criticizing the implicit evolutionary conceptualizations of modernization as a uniform process, defined modernization as "a type of social change which originated in the industrial revolution of England, 1760–1830, and in the political revolution of France, 1794" ([1964] 1977). Modernization is a historically specific process that contrasts sharply with the experience of "follower" societies who struggle to narrow the gap between themselves and those nations that have already modernized. And Dore, focusing on factory organization and labor relations in Japan, argued that because more advanced technology was available in the case of Japan—among other resources—it could skip, as it were, many of the historical processes pragmatically worked through by Britain in its development of factory organization (Dore 1973). The notion that the developing countries have a range of technology, educational techniques, types of mass communication, etc., potentially at their disposal—and that the developing West did not—is a position reminiscent of the diffusionist critique of classical evolutionary theory, and, similarly, results in a greater stress on the historical diversity of development processes.

2.     Other observers have argued that modernization theory ignores the political dimension, particularly group conflict. In one respect development/modernization theory can be regarded as a kind of dynamic part of the functionalist perspective, namely, it regarded both traditional societies and modern societies as having more-or-less coherent and consistent cultural and institutional. Insofar as the functionalist perspective in general came in for the criticism that it was either incapable or unwilling to deal with domination, dissensus, and conflict (Coser 1956; Dahrendorf, 1959), that criticism spilled over to development/modernization theory. Applied to modernization, such a criticism appear to have only partial merit. The "political system" approach adopted by Almond and Coleman (1960) focuses on "input functions," such as interest articulation and political communication, and "output functions," such as rule-making, rule application and rule adjudication. This focus connotes a lesser place for domination and coercion than in some other types of political theory. But many theorists who might on general grounds be regarded as functionalists stressed the political dimension of modernization. Eisenstadt (1964), for example, traced "breakdowns in modernization" to the specific failure of

     elites to consolidate integrative mechanisms and symbols, and in general he gives a central role to political elites in the developmental process. Hoselitz (1960) drew a fundamental distinction between developmental patterns that were "autonomous," that is, relatively free from governmental intervention, and those that were "induced" by government. And Smelser, in a general essay on the process of modernization, characterized it as a conflictual process: "a three-way tug-of-war among the forces of tradition, the forces of differentiation, and the new forces of integration" (1963). One suspects that the real animus in this critique is not the complaint that the political dimension in general is ignored, but rather that a particular type of political situation—the domination of one economic class over others—is understressed, absent, or denied.

3.     Yet another group of observers assert that development/modernization theory ignores external factors in social change. Bendix rejected the three evolutionist assumptions that closed systems (1) are either traditional or modern, (2) undergo internal differentiation, and (3) inevitably develop. These assumptions, he argued, are especially inapplicable to newly developing nations:

If we want to explain the historical breakthrough in Europe, our emphasis will be on the continuity of intra-societal changes. If we wish to include in our account the worldwide repercussions of this breakthrough and hence the differential process of modernization, our emphasis will be on the confluence of intrinsic and extrinsic changes of social structures. ([1964] 1977, 433)

     Frank asserted that most studies of development and underdevelopment "fail to take account of the economic and other relations between the metropolis and its economic colonies throughout the history of the worldwide expansion and development of the mercantilist and capitalist system" (1969, 3). The same critique underlies the basic premises of world-system theorists as well.

     Although possessing some merit, this line of criticism also seems overdrawn, Hoselitz, the "developmentalist" bête noire of Frank's polemic, systematically incorporated two international dimensions into his analysis of economic growth: whether growth takes place in the context of political expansionism or in an intrinsic way, and whether the country is politically and economically dominant or satellitic. And Rostow, another target of Frank's criticisms, made a fundamental distinction between early and late developing countries:

As a matter of historical fact a reactive nationalism—reacting against intrusion from more advanced nations—has been a most important

and powerful motive in the transition from traditional to modern societies, at least as important as the profit motive. Men holding effective authority or influence have been willing to uproot traditional societies not, primarily, to make more money but because the traditional society failed—or threatened to fail—to protect them from humiliation by foreigners. (1960, 26–27)

     And Parsons, commenting on the postwar economic situation, observed the following:

World industrialism must affect the problem of political independence for former colonial areas. It is also primary source both of markets for may of their products and of competition for their own attempts at new lines of production. It can also be a source of technical and managerial help and financial support, and the degree and nature of control which may go with such help is always a complicated and touchy problem. (1960, 117)

     Again, one suspects that the true complaint is not that development/ modernization theorists were unaware of the international dimension or that they failed to stress it; the true complaint is that they failed to acknowledge what critics regarded as one type of international relationship, namely, the continuing domination of world capitalism over the dependent areas of the world.