THE DIFFERENTIATED SYSTEM OF MODERN SOCIETIES

chapter 10 - THE DIFFERENTIATED SYSTEM OF MODERN SOCIETIES

Modernization of Non-Western Societies, 226

The system of modern societies, though originally European, has been extended to the entire world. What does it mean to say that the many different countries of the contemporary world constitute one system of societies? It means (1) that, increasingly, all contemporary societies share the same general ideas and values but (2) that, even in an interdependent world, societies are not carbon copies of one another; they play different roles in the world community.

In connection with Point (1), the previous chapter paid special attention to the United States, not out of any parochial loyalties, but because I believe that the United States is a model for other countries in structural innovations central to modern societal development. The united States is extending the organization of social life in individualistic, decentralized, and associational directions (the historic roots of which can be traced to the feudal period in Europe). Comparable patterns of individualism, decentralization, and associational pluralism also characterize closely related societies, Canada and Australia.¹ Other societies will necessarily adopt these features as they move toward modernity. This perspective on the United States is congruent with the picture of American society first presented by Tacqueville in the 1830s and is an alternative interpretation to recent portrayals of the United States as the prototype of bureaucratization and the concentration of power.

¹ See S M Lipset, The First New Nation (New York: Basic Books, 1963).

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In connection with Point (2), the United States has specialized also in a different kind of world leadership: in attempting to influence through political and economic intervention the way life is lived on this planet. This kind of leadership - an explicit promoting of goals for the world to attain - has led to American involvement in two world Wars, in post-war reconstruction, and in a variety of alliances and smaller military conflicts. Like the United States, the Soviet Union has also sought to promote goals for the world to attain. Since the goals of these two societies are different, their societal emphasis on goal attainment has inevitably brought them into conflict - but so far not direct nuclear confrontation. Other societal emphases (in a differentiated world system) are possible. Unlike the United States and the Soviet Union, the role of France and Germany has emphasized maintaining the cultural traditions of the world community rather than leading it toward new goals.² Still another emphasis is the integrative one: attempting to mediate differences among fellow members of the community of nations and thereby fostering solidarity. Japan, Sweden, Switzerland, many Third World countries have sought alternatives to aligning themselves either with the United States or the Soviet Union. This is what I mean when I speak of a system of modern societies: extension of a common culture to all societies, yet different societies playing differentiated roles within the world community. In what follows in the rest of this chapter, I shall discuss the place of the Soviet Union, the New Europe, and modernizing non-Western societies in the system of modern societies.

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