My intellectual biography is one long quest for an adequate explanation of contemporary reality, so that I and others might act upon it. The quest was both intellectual and political, and I have always felt it could not be one without being at the same time the other – for me or for anyone.

I suppose I started this quest when I was in high school, which was in New York City during the Second World War. My family was very politically conscious, and world affairs were always being discussed in our home. The fight against Nazism and fascism was our primary concern, and long before Pearl Harbor. We were also very conscious of the great split in the world left, that between the Second and Third Internationals. Even in the muted atmosphere of the unity brought about by wartime, the issues that divided …  click here to read more

Copyright 2018, Immanuel Wallerstein,used by permission of Agence Global