世界システムと多国籍企業

世界システム論

抄録

Immanuel Wallerstein's writings on the “world-system, ” like any other grand-theory-oriented works, have been subject to a great deal of criticisms since his The Modern World-System I was first published in 1974. For example, he is criticized for his alleged neglect of “domestic” factors and the “interstate system” factors. He allegedly reduces everything to the international economic division of labor (“world-economy” in his word), thus making his arguments too holistic to be falsifiable.
However, many of these criticisms are based on inadequate understanding of Wallersteins's theoretical framework, in which he distinguishes the reshuffling of the three-tier structure (core-semiperiphery-periphery) of the world-economy during the period of “contraction” from the strengthening and persistence of the existing structure during the period of “expansion.”
Wallerstein's argument about the period of “expansion” is, as his critics insist, largely reductionist and unfalsifiable. However, when he explains the reshuffling of the world-economy during the period of “contraction, ” he does utilize “domestic” factors such as efficiency of the state bureaucracy and “inter-state system” factors such as the rivalry among core countries. Therefore, one can examine the strength (or weakness) of Wallerstein's theoretical framework much more adequately by analyzing what actually happens during the period of “contraction.”
A survey of major industry studies dealing with interactions between the TNC's and the semiperiphery states of Latin America leads us to a tentative conclusion that the reshuffling of the world-economy which, Wallerstein predicts, should occur during the period of “contraction, ” is not occurring at least at the present time of “contraction” which, according to Wallerstein, began in the latter half of the 1960's.
This is largely attributable to the changes in basic characteristics of the “product life cycle” in our days. Previously, this cycle functioned in the way in which the locations of production of a certain industry moved from one country to another accompanying a change of major producers. At the present day, this type of transfer of production centers is not observed even in some of the industries in which the standardization of technology has progressed. Instead, one huge entity, TNC, organizes a whole chain of production integrating a large number of countries in an intracompany division of labor. Since the TNC's attempt to keep the most strategic and profitable parts of their productive chain for core countries where a large diversified market and well-developed infrastructure are available and leave less profitable ones for the semiperiphery and the periphery, the hierarchical structure of the world-economy has not changed at all.
The semiperiphery states, in spite of their increasing efficiency, have been unsuccessful in forcing the TNC's to transfer most strategic facilities to their countries. The TNC's keep their power vis-à-vis the states and producers in the semiperiphery, taking advantage of their capability of intensive advertizement, product differentiation, mutual cooperations, etc.