Discussion:Immanuel Wallerstein

Traduction peu claire à franciser

A l'origine de cette page fort intéressante (datant de 2005), il y a un texte de départ en anglais (copié ci-après à partir de l'historique). Le problème, c'est que la traduction ne me parait pas très satisfaisante. Des anglicistes pourront peut-être nous dire si ces obscurités ne sont pas dues au fait que le texte anglais de départ contient quelques points confus. Je les ai soulignés ci-dessous (avec mes remarques en italique:

"His most important work, The Modern World-System, appeared in three volumes in 1974, 1980, and 1989. In it, Wallerstein mainly draws on three intellectual influences: Karl Marx, whom he follows in emphasizing underlying economic factors and their dominance over ideological factors in global politics; (traduit à tort par "dont il défend l’emphase des facteurs économiques") French historian Fernand Braudel, who had described the development and political implications of extensive networks of economic exchange within the large empires of antiquity; and--presumably--the practical experience and impressions gained from his own work regarding post-colonial Africa and the various theories addressing "developing nations".

One aspect of his work that Wallerstein certainly deserves credit for, was anticipating the growing importance of the North-South-Conflict already on the height of the Cold War.

Wallerstein rejected the notion of a "Third World", claiming there was only one world connected by a complex network of economic exchange relationships -- i.e., a "world-economy" or "world-system", in which the dichotomy of capital and labour, and the accumulation of capital by competing agents (historically including, but not limited to nation-states) account for frictions. (traduit abusivement par "résulte par des frictions")

Wallerstein locates the origin of the modern world-system in 16th century north-western Europe. An initially only slight advance in capital accumulation in Britain and France, due to specific political circumstances at the end of the period of feudalism, set in motion a process of gradual expansion, as a result of which only one global network, or system of economic exchange exists today. A major development occurred during the era of imperialism, which brought virtually every area on earth into contact with European-style capitalist economy.

The capitalist world-system is, however, far from homogeneous in cultural, political, and economical terms--instead characterised by fundamental differences in civilizational development, accumulation of political power and capital. Contrary to affirmative theories of modernization and capitalism, Wallerstein does not conceive of these differences as mere residues or irregularities that can and will be overcome as the system as a whole evolves. Much more, a lasting division of the world in core, semi-periphery and periphery is an inherent feature of the world-system. Areas which have so far remained outside the reach of the world-system, enter it at the stage of periphery. There is a fundamental and institutionally stabilized division of labour between core and periphery: While the core has a high level of technological development and manufactures complex products, the role of the periphery is to supply raw materials, agricultural products and cheap labour for the expanding agents of the core. Economic exchange between core and periphery takes places on unequal terms: The periphery is forced to sell its products at low prices, but has to buy the core's products at comparatively high prices, an unequal state which, once established, tends to stabilize itself due to inherent, quasi-deterministic constraints. The statuses of core and periphery are not, however, mutually exclusive and fixed to certain geographic areas; instead, they are relative to each other and shifting: There is a zone called semi-periphery, which acts as a periphery to the core, and a core to the periphery. At the end of the 20th century, this zone would comprise, e.g., Eastern Europe, China, Brazil. As Naomi Klein has recently demonstrated with the example of "sweat shops" in developed countries, peripheral, semi-peripheral and core zones can also co-exist very closely in the same geographic area."

En conclusion cette traduction me parait peu claire et sérieusement à franciser par un meilleur connaisseur des travaux d'EW que moi. Bienvenue aux amateurs ! --- Alter005 ^{[ --> discuter]} 19 avril 2008 à 16:17 (CEST)