{'fraction_non_alphanumeric': 0.026908023483365948, 'fraction_numerical': 0.0019569471624266144, 'mean_word_length': 5.512738853503185, 'pattern_counts': {'":': 0, '<': 0, '<?xml version=': 0, '>': 0, 'https://': 0, 'lorem ipsum': 0, 'www.': 0, 'xml': 0}, 'pii_count': 0, 'substrings_counts': 0, 'word_list_counts': {'cursed_substrings.json': 0, 'profanity_word_list.json': 0, 'sexual_word_list.json': 0, 'zh_pornsignals.json': 0}}
Book Review: World-Systems Analysis: An Introduction; Alternatives: The United States Confronts the World

Grand narratives can shape the political outlook of generations. Worldsystems analysis is one of the more important academic grand narratives of the second half of the 20th century. Its impact on the social sciences has been remarkable. World-systems analysis spawned a range of important institutions that revolutionized sociological thought, such as the Fernand Braudel Centre at Binghamton University and its journal Review, the PEWS (Political Economy of the World System) section of the American Sociological Association (ASA), as well as a number of more recent research bodies such as the Institute for Research on World Systems (IROWS) at the University of California. Moreover, world-systems analysis crucially shaped sociology and history departments around the world, inspiring interdisciplinary area studies approaches, and countless social scientists are, in one form or another, indebted to this body of thought. Perhaps more importantly still, many social movements around the globe have been inspired by the insights promoted by world-systems analysis, translating its academic concepts into a more colloquial language, and some of its elements have been absorbed by institutions of global governance. Indeed, some of its insights have seeped into our epistemological foundations, colouring the way many of us see the world. World-Systems Analysis: An Introduction (hereafter WSA) reminds us of the enduring importance of this radical intellectual tradition. World-systems analysis explains historical events (‘dust’ in Braudel’s and Wallerstein’s terms) by bringing to light patterns and connections reaching back as far as the 16th century (according to Wallerstein, the origin of the world capitalist system). This allows world-systems theorists to render visible the social systems that impacts on our lives. For Wallerstein, one of the founders of this mode of enquiry, world-systems theory aims at foregrounding and