This paper is a historical sociological exploration into the viability of using world-systems theory to examine premodern societies. Looking at world-system theory from the anthropological aspect of interactive networks, I argue that the most important and controversial network is the information network, although political/economic methods of studying world-systems persist among researchers of world-systems. The model for the premodern world-system is different enough from the modern model that the question arises if world-systems is even a viable framework for studying the premodern period. The main contribution I make in this paper is the discussion of four "facts" ala Durkheim's "social facts" that when considered, inform us of the effectiveness of information flows throughout premodern world-systems, absent of modern speed of transportation and communications transmissions. Information flowed effectively through the premodern world-system via the steady and constant ability of people to navigate these systems by traditions of human resiliency and social cooperation that we still see in indigenous populations today. The human element in the study of world-systems is the key to understanding premodern world-systems. A failed information network meant failed systemness, but it did not necessarily mean the failure of social organization. That continued through traditions of human resiliency. Putting the human face on the world-system may be the way to save this theory as a viable tool for the study of society.

This dissertation examines the causes and consequences of second language education policies at the global level and in a national comparative framework, largely with quantitative data and pooled time series analyses.

Languages were selected into school curricula largely because of the way the European world-system expanded over the past few hundred years, with colonization and the spread of the nation-state model among the most important factors. Countries that make studying second languages obligatory, by making attendance mandatory in the grades where second languages are taught, tend to be younger and use more widely spoken languages; the effects of IGO memberships is fragile indicating that the isomorphic processes associated with the world polity should not be overemphasized.

The consequences of second language policies are first examined in terms of stratification and empirical analyses, with a sample of African countries from 1980 to 2000 show that where colonial languages are used as the medium of instruction inequality (measured as Gini coefficient for household income) is significantly higher, net of robust cross-national predictors. The amount of time devoted to the study of these languages as subjects, however, has no impact on inequality. Consequences are also examined in terms of economic development (measured as GDP per capita), specifically in so far as second language skills can be understood as human capital that facilitates economic development through the diffusion of technology and promotion of trade. Empirical analyses with a large group of non-English-speaking countries show a positive relationship between time spent on English and GDP per capita for the period 1980 to 2005.

The larger picture that emerges is the causes and consequences of second language education policies at the national level are part of larger global level processes, like the expansion of the European world-system, the spread of a global level culture and the dynamics of global economic networks.

The modern system of global governance is comprised of a hegemonic cycle, a network of state-IGO affiliations, and the interstate system that derives its continuity from the Treaty of Westphalia in 1648. To empirically capture multiple dimensions of each of these three elements of global governance, this research examines the emergence and development of three separate networks, these being networks of international trade, foreign aid, and IGO membership since the establishment of the League of Nations. Network analysis was performed on matrices for the period where data are available, rendering the densities, centralities, and hierarchical structures of these networks and their respective hegemons. These values were subsequently incorporated into an attribute dataset of established, non-network measures of global governance—among them, a hegemon’s military budget, and the ratio of world imports to world GDP—in an effort to assess measures of autocorrelation, cross-correlation, and conduct other time-series analysis, including Prais-Winsten regressions. Several relationships were identified using bivariate and partial cross-correlation coefficients, though there is little uniformity in them from which to draw a singular narrative.

This dissertation utilizes a feminist theoretical model of women's autonomy to explain much of the variability in national fertility rates from 1990-2006. While many previous efforts have been made to determine what causes variation in fertility, this research utilizes panel analysis to examine some cultural variables that have been largely ignored in the field, specifically Islam and the practices of polygyny and female genital mutilation (FGM). These variables are hypothesized to affect fertility rates positively. This research also re-examines previously studied economic, political, and educational indicators of female autonomy, in addition to economic development as measured by GNI per capita, using multivariate regression analysis to determine the strength of the effects of the cultural indicators of female autonomy on fertility change vis-à-vis these other variables. Results from the analysis suggest that a significant negative relationship exists between FGM and fertility change, and that a significant positive relationship exists between Islam and fertility change, but that significant relationships do not exist for any of the other variables examined and fertility. The neoclassical economic model of fertility change is not substantiated and arguments about women's autonomy and fertility are somewhat supported. Implications for further research and public policy are discussed.

This dissertation addresses an important question in the evolution of world-systems of human societies: how does energy use shape the dynamics that occur, in particular intersocietal differences in geopolitical and economic power and also in environmental degradation? A general theory is developed that predicts the existence of a positive feedback loop between levels of energy use and intersocietal power that can be constrained by resource shortages and other negative environmental effects, the growth of environmental ideologies, and competition between societies. In addition, the theory predicts that more powerful societies have the ability to generate ecological rent by locating their degradation outside their borders. This can create a power-reducing effect as the energy-related degradation is experienced more by less powerful societies.

Empirical analyses on a dataset of countries with available data since the early nineteenth century and an additional dataset for those from 1973-2008 were conducted. Results indicate that there has been a decoupling of economic growth from energy consumption within more developed countries. Growth rates for energy consumption per capita and geopolitical and economic power are strong predictors of each other, and both predict environmental degradation per capita, but with different effect sizes and contributing variables that vary by the type of world-system ranking used, and the location in the world-system. Specifically, the semiperiphery and periphery are the locations of the strongest growth rates while the core has the highest levels.

The results demonstrate the need for rethinking the theoretical model and the use of complexity theory and thermodynamics in research such as this. Future research on dynamism of the periphery, the effects and location of environmental degradation, and the possibility of historical and contemporary country-level studies would enhance this research. As we face enormous challenges due to constraints on energy supplies and the impacts of energy production and consumption on the biosphere, continued research in this area is an important endeavour.

The question of sustainability has been important for plastics firms and their industry associations for decades, however there has not been much social science scholarship specifically exploring how plastics firms, or their industry associations, perform sustainably. This project uses 2016 Toxics Release Inventory (TRI) data, financial data from Hoovers, and data on industry associations to answer questions about the plastics firm and industry association characteristics most associated with toxic emissions.

After a theoretical exploration of sustainability in Chapter 2, multilevel regressions are conducted in Chapter 3 demonstrating that plastics firm financial and structural variables (Revenue, Risky Firm Credit, Subsidiary Levels, and Facility Employees) are significantly associated with increases of Planned Toxic Emissions. Specifically, both Planned and Fugitive Emissions increase as a function of firm Revenue and Subsidiary Layers. In addition, a cubic function of Facility Employees demonstrates increases in Planned and Fugitive Emissions per employee for smaller facilities, and decreases per employee for larger facilities. These findings indicate that the size, wealth, and structure of plastics firms affect how sustainability is practiced.

Chapter 4 explores what is currently known in the social sciences about industry associations and highlights the role they play as knowledge collectivities in terms of sustainability. Industry association variables on membership, the amount of sustainability information on their websites, and whether the association has a sustainability committee are added to the previous multilevel regression models. Industry association membership is associated with higher Planned Emissions and lower Fugitive Emissions, firms that are members of industry associations with high sustainability rhetoric tend to have lower emissions, while member firms of industry associations with sustainability committees tend to have higher emissions. So, industry association membership appears to be associated with effects on member firm emissions, although not always in predicted ways.

This project furthers the study of organizations and manufacturing by focusing on plastics, an important US manufacturing industry, by looking at both Planned and Fugitive Emissions, and by dealing with data for both publicly and privately owned organizations, including very large versus very small organizations.

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This article presents a societal level cross-cultural analysis that explores the relationship between division of labor and stratification, as well as the effect that information systems and transportation have on this relationship. It is reasoned that social stratification and political hierarchy, as integrative forces are, in part, a function of the division of labor, information systems and transportation. The analysis finds a positive relationship between occupational specialization and political and economic inequalities in 186 small-scale societies, as well as an increased centralization of political and economic power as the cost of exchanging information and resources decrease resulting from innovation in information systems and transportation. In other words, concordant with the conflict view of technology, information systems and transportation innovations seem to have historically benefited mostly the individuals at the top of these political and economic stratification systems as they have an amplifying effect on the division of labor and stratification relationship. The results are discussed in terms of understanding the role that information systems, and transportation play in the de-centralizing or centralizing of resource as well as the decision-making. The article closes with a discussion of possible implications for contemporary societies.

This thesis argues that what distinguishes all major, categorical types of human societal organization is the underlying logic operant in the unstated, dynamic ruleset that determines whether social entities and social actions at any given scale of analysis are accounted for as legitimate, or illegitimate. These are here termed “logics of legitimation,” and it is argued that all of the features said to distinguish modern society from the prior historical era by theorists such as Weber, Durkheim, Marx, and Foucault can be understood as expressions of a logic of legitimation centered on systematicness, which is the cumulative effect of the mutually-reinforcing, interacting operation of six quietly operating principles that every societal feature distinctive to the modern era exemplifies one or more of at a time. After a delineation of the areas of overlap and divergence between this central claim and core tenets of the neoinstitutionalist school, it is supported by using (a) the systems logic of legitimation, (b) it’s complex of underlying principles, and (c) it’s bright contrast with the preceding “sovereignty” logic of legitimation to analyze and make sense of historically recent macroinstitutional changes in Western society that have occurred in three major domains: economics, politics, and culture. Since the concept of “modernity” is both a theoretical abstraction and a historical time-marker, the task of this thesis is only completed with a final substantive section that attempts to mark the origins of the systems logic of legitimation’s emergence in the historical chronology of Western societal evolution. The account is suggestive of potential mechanisms for the shift from one logic to another, which warrant future research. The concluding sections suggest research designs for verifying the theory here espoused, and potential applications in the studies of international geopolitics, gender, and race.