London School of Economics

Review
Author(s): Rodney Barker
Review by: Rodney Barker
Source: The British Journal of Sociology, Vol. 44, No. 2 (Jun., 1993), pp. 361-362
Published by: Wiley on behalf of London School of Economics and Political Science
Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/591245
Accessed: 09-11-2015 10:52 UTC

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Bookreviews

361

intervene.ButasMilbankproceeds,some
method,some form of studyof cultural
formations becomes apparent to him,
even if this meansa 'newsociology',one
tamed for analyticalpurposewithinone
of the chapelsthatlitterthe cityof God.
Althoughdifficultto read, this book is
wellworthwrestlingwithand deservesto
generate debate on the links between
sociology,philosophyand theology for
sometimeto come.
KieranFlanagan
Departmentof Sociology
Universityof Bristol

Historyof ChildbirthJacques
GeltsPolity
Press1991336pp.39.95
There are many historiesof childbirth,
but no single definitive one would be
appropriateto a historythatis capableof
being constructedin so many different
ways.The perspectiveof this one is culturalanthropology,the time periodfour
centuries,and the principalgeographical
referent is France. In telling his story,
Jacques Gelis is as much interested in
what the historicaland anthropological
evidence can communicateabout the
'mental attitudes'of past populations,
and in interrogatingcommon (mis)conceptionsof the present- for example,the
early age of marriage, the dramatic
eventsof parturition,andthe hugesizeof
familiesin the rural past. He is also at
pains to avoid what he describesas the
two main false historicalinterpretations
of childbirth:the one thatchildbirthused
to be easyandonlybecamedifficultwhen
obstetricianswere invented, and the
other that childbirthhas only become
easy becauseobstetricianshave made it
so.

In negotiatinga path between these

two notions,Gelis has dug up and presented to the reader a wealthof detail,
particularly about rural peasant
childbirthsin the pre-modernperiod.A
focal theme is the consonnancebetween
childbirthand nature- the fact that in
rural culturewomen'sbodies were perceived animalistically,
as obeying, along
withall animaland vegetablematter,the
naturallawsof the universe.Thus Gelis

contextualizesthe response to the frequentexperienceof maternaland infant

deatn-not as uncarlng,as ItIS SOmetlmeS
depicted,but simplyas acceptingof the
mortalframewithinwhichreproduction
occurs.
The bookhasthe enormousadvantage
of locatingthe culturalmanagementand
meaningof birthwithinthe widersetting
of attitudesto children,childhood,the
familyand generalunderlyingbeliefsystems. But it is, perhapspartlyin consequence,sprinkledwithbothcredibleand
incredible(sometimespoorlyreferenced)
generalizations.A tendency to use the
term 'man'both genericallyand specifi
cally,and to regardthe relativepositions
of men and women as unproblematic,
obscuresanyoriginalcontributionto the
theoretical understanding of reproductionand genderrelations.
.

Ann Oakley
SocialScienceResearchUnit
Instituteof Education
Universityof London

The Lcgitimationof Power David BeethamMacmillan1991267pp.35 (10.99

paper)
The virtueof DavidBeetham'sTheLegitimationof Power,a bookwhichstandsin the
longtraditionof attemptsto knittogether
the normativeand the descriptiveaccountsof legitimacy,is thatit unpacksthe
conceptwitha clearand usefulanatomisation. Beetham presents legitimacyas
existing(and its extent is variable)when
regimesstickto theirownlaws;whenthey
arejustifiedin termsof thebeliefsof their
subjects;and when there are practical
actionswhichexpressconsent.In setting
up Weberas his fall guy, he mountsan
attackwhichcouldmoreappropriately
be
aimedat those socialscientistswho have
assumedthatbecauselegitimacyinvolved
the beliefsof subjects,it wasunderstood
simply by counting heads in social surveys.
Beetham'sdefinitionof justificationin
termsof people'sbeliefsrephrasesrather
thanreplacestheviewto whichhe objects.
Justified to whom? If to people themselves, then what we have is a more

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Bookreviews

362
sophisticatedversionof the same thing:
'Regimesare legitimatewhen people believe they are legitimate because they
believethey accordwith the valuesthey
believetheyhold.'
WhereasWeber locates legitimacyin
the authorityof governments,Beetham
locatesit in the approvalof subjects.He
argues,moreover,that there is a kindof
liberaldemocraticratchet,whichmakesit
difficult for states to regress once they
havearrivedat the levelof popularsovereignty. The irony is that the principal
difference between the book's account
and Weber's is not the one Beetham
suggests, between simplistic opinion
countingand a moreactiveconceptionof
humanaction,butbetweenWeber'ssceptical elitism, and Beetham'srigorously
optimisticliberaldemocracy.
RodneyBarker
LondonSchoolof Econamics

UnthinkingSocial Science: The Limits

of Nineteenth-Century Paradigms
Immanuel WallersteinCambridgePolity
Press199139.50 (12.50paper)
Anyone interested in macro-sociology
shouldfrom time to time dip into 'world
systems theory' as an antidote to the
nationaland specializedparochialisms
to
whichwe all fall prey.Whobetterto read
than the founder of the school,its most
creative,imaginativeand elegantwriter?
These twenty essays have all been previouslypublished,butin sucha varietyof
journals and collectionsbetween 1982
and 1991 that probablyno-one has alreadyreadmorethana handfulof them.
They make stimulatingreading,though
none is a realblock-buster.Wallersteinis
always readable, often persuasiveand
occasionallyprofound. He is a genuine
scholar,with far fewer affectationsthan
academicsof his distinctionusuallyacquire,and he neverpatronizesus.
By now we do not expect (nor should
we wish)himto 'recant'histheory.There
are few surprises. He sticks with the
theorywhichis presumablyby now familiar to most readersof thisjournal. Indeed, by applyingworld-systemstheory
so broadly,to so manytopics,theseessays

add considerablyto its power and its

plausibility.
The eighteenthessay,'Callfor a debate
aboutthe paradigm',explainsthe book's
title(itshouldobviouslybe the firstessay).
We must unthink a number of nineteenth-century assumptions: that the
socialsciencesconstituteseparate,intellectuallycoherent 'disciplines',that the
idiographicnomotheticdistinctiongives
us the distinctrealmsof historyandsocial
science,thathumanbeingslive in single,
bounded societies which are implicitly
nation-states,thatcapitalismis grounded
on free competition,that the end of the
eighteenth century saw a fundamental
bourgeoiscapitalistrevolutionand that
history cs)ntainsdevelopmentand progress. These assumptionsare then attackedin the otheressays.
We all love to attack,often to caricature, supposed 'orthodoxy'.Doubtless
manyreaderswillprotest'Ihavealready
unthoughtmuchof this'.YetWallerstein
does not spend muchtime on wholesale
demolition of 'orthodoxy'.Instead he
illustratestheirinadequacieson empirical
cases.He coversmoregroundand enters
morecontroversiesthan I can here even
mention,let alone review.Naturallythe
capitalist world-systemis his masterconcept,his 'society'and his 'revolution',
generatinghis 'laws'.He arguesit is our
only Gesellschczft,
and that it has created
our principalbutmultipleGemetnschoften.
The significanceof the IndustrialRevolution is that during it (not becauseof it)
Britain became the hegemonic Power
within the world system. The French
Revolution was not as significantfor
Franceor Europeas it wasfor peripheral
partsof the world-system
likeHaiti.Butit
did generatethe firstof the 'anti-systemic'
movementsand ideologies which have
periodicallyconvulsedworld capitalism
and which are now growing stronger.
Through the medium of a critiqueof
Myrdal'sstudiesof racismand development he argues that class and ethnic
stratificationare alwaysand necessarily
entwinedin the modernworld- because
this is functionalfor the capitalistworld
system. National developmentis an illusion:once capitalistmarketsfill up the
world,for somenationsto gaingroundin

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