30 Quotes by Immanuel Wallerstein

The language of intrinsic human rights represented a significant advance beyond the previous language of world religions in terms of its universal applicability and its thiswordliness.

Far from being Eurocentric, my analysis "exoticizes" Europe. Europe is historically aberrant. In some ways this was a historical accident, not entirely Europe's fault. But, in any case, it is nothing about which Europe should boast. Perhaps Europe and the world will one day be cured of this terrible malady with which Europe (and through Europe the world) has been afflicted.

People resist exploitation. They resist as actively as they can, as passively as they must.

La science sociale di XIXe siecle nous a legue un terrible heritage, l'idee que els processus se divisent en trois champs separes: le politique, l'economique et le socioculturel.

The world system is coming to the structural crisis.

The primary ideology that operated to create, socialize, and reproduce them was not the ideology of racism. It was that of universalism.

Historical capitalism is a materialist civilization.

It was the French Revolution that served as the catalyst of this renovation. Its impact was to make the concept of popular sovereignty the new moral justification for the political system of historical capitalism.

That is why we may say that the historical development of capitalism has involved the thrust towards the commodification of everything.