Keywords
Polanyi, Double Movement, American Nations, Modes of Production
Abstract
In this paper, I reveal the political economy of Woodard’s American Nations. Drawing on Eric Wolf’s Europe and the People Without History and Karl Polanyi’s The Great Transformation, I argue that each of the eleven nations is predicated on one of Wolf’s three modes of production: kin-ordered, tributary, or capitalist. These modes of production can be understood as reoccurring sets of social relations that structure the economic foundations of a given society around that society’s specific political culture. Through demonstrating the applicability of the modes of production concept to the American nations, I argue that we cannot only reveal the underlying economic foundations of each nation, but suggest their future socio-economic trajectories as they batter up against an ever-more chaotic international political economy.
Publisher
University of Puget Sound
Faculty Advisor
Bill Haltom
Publication Date
Spring 3-8-2016
Genre
Dissertation/Thesis
Format
Rights
Discipline
Politics & Government
Track
U.S. Politics
Subject Area
Political Science
Recommended Citation
Scharff, Austin, "Refining the History of the Eleven Rival Regional Cultures of North America: A Politico-Economic Analysis of the American Nations" (2016). Politics & Government Undergraduate Theses. 3.
https://soundideas.pugetsound.edu/pg_theses/3