SOCIOL 2 Lecture Notes - Lecture 13: National Human Rights Institution, World-Systems Theory, Periphery Countries
Document Summary
Responding to critique 1 (power & inequality) Theory can argue that it"s often not clear how aspects of world culture (e. g. human rights) benefit powerful countries. Theory can acknowledge that isomorphism also happens because of other processes, such as military or economic coercion. Responding to critique 2 (does isomorphism matter?) Theory argues that policies/structures are not always decoupled from practice, but can produce real change. Research shows that national human rights institutions have some positive impact in reducing human rights violations! World systems theory and world society theory differ from realism/liberalism in common ways: Main unit of analysis is the world rather than the nation-state. Societies are shaped much more profoundly by relationships and processes external to the nation-state than in ir theories (a world economy and a world culture respectively) Share a focus on the world as the unit of analysis (contrast with realism/liberalism) Theoretical emphasis is on the world as a single capitalist world economy.
