World Society or world polity theory, introduced by John Meyer and colleagues, is an attempt to explain the formation and function of the nation-state in terms of worldwide cultural and associational processes. This perspective is a strong departure from much of the work in political sociology which has taken a far more materialist perspective on explaining national and international political change. Below I review the main concepts in World Society theory and show how they compare to other key works in political sociology. In particular, I will focus on Meyer and colleagues findings regarding educational systems around the world. In the end, I believe it will be clear that this perspective has a great deal to offer to our general understanding of sociopolitical phenomena, but as an augmentation of current theories rather than a replacement.

Meyer, Boli, Thomas, and Ramirez (1997) set out to account for the nation-state as a worldwide institution formed by world cultural and associational processes. In service of this account, they address three important aspects: 1) characteristics of nation-states resulting from exogenously-driven processes, 2) characteristics of World Society that enhance the impact of world culture and 3) the dynamics of the World Society. Before delving into these three aspects, I think it is important to discuss some of the basic premises of the World Society theory.

Meyer et al’s theory is basically an extension of the new institutionalist approach to organizational analysis (DiMaggio; Meyer). Thus, they see institutional forms and culture as the primary factor in determining organizational outcomes. Meyer et al provide a useful framework for understanding the relationship between their theory and others in the field. The discuss four perspectives on sociopolitical phenomena: 1) microrealist, 2) macrorealist, 3) microphenomenological, and 4) macrophenomenological. Microrealist theories focus on material circumstances of power and interest at the local or national level. Traditional Marxist analysis is good example of this kind of work, though this is also the perspective of much of the political economic analysis in political sociology. Macrorealist theories focus on material circumstances of power and interest at the international level. World-system theory is perhaps the best-known example. Microphenomenological theories focus on culture and interpretive processes at the local or national level. Almond and Verba’s political culture approach is a prime example of this work. Meyer et al place themselves in the fourth category of macrophenomenological theories focusing on the cultural and interpretive processes at the international level. The first three perspectives suggest differentiation between nation-states for material or cultural reasons and thus would predict a significant amount of variation between nation-states in terms of sociopolitical structures. Meyer et al’s theory, similar to many globalization theories, posits an increasingly stateless world and thus would predict far less variation than the other theories.

These four theoretical perspectives tend to predict very different outcomes. For example, consider female enrollment in higher education. Microrealist theories would predict variation based on national material circumstances and so would expect that female enrollment would be higher in countries with higher levels of development. Macrorealist theories would predict higher enrollment in countries at the core, rather than periphery. Microphenomenological accounts would predict differences based on national or local culture and so would expect higher enrollment in Western countries than in Islamic countries. Macrophenomenological accounts, like the World Society, would predict some measure of consistency in female enrollment across all countries. Indeed, Ramirez found this consistency in enrollment to be the case.

Now that the basic comparisons have been covered, let us consider the three aspects of Meyer et al’s theory. First, they posit three important characteristics of nation-states resulting from exogenously-driven processes. The primary characteristic, and the one that seems to have prompted much their work, is structural isomorphism. Put simply, Meyer and colleagues have found a great deal of isomorphism amongst nation-states around the world and have found that their institutionalist/cultural theory provides an explanation. These isomorphisms exist in constitutional structure (Boli), welfare regimes (Thomas and Lauderdale), and educational systems (Meyer, Ramirez, and Soysal), to name only a few.

The second and third characteristics attributed to the World Society are closely linked. They are expansive structuration and a decoupling of these institutional structures from local political and cultural circumstances. For example, Meyer and his colleagues have find that developed and developing nations institute national systems of education at roughly the same time; long before the developing nations have the resources or need for implementing them. Benevot and Riddle find a surprising similarity amongst mass education curriculums regardless of the socioeconomic or political circumstances of the countries investigated. Taken together, this means that countries are formally expanding educational structures, often in spite of the fact that they cannot support them, so that school-age children in the U.S., China, Chile, and South Africa are learning roughly the same things at the same times despite the fact that the future prospects and skills needed by these children are vastly different.

It is very difficult to explain these similarities using the other kinds of theories outlined above. In particular, World Society theory provides an account of motivation that seems superior to realist theories focusing on power and interest which tend to conceptualize states, citizens, and groups as rational actors responding to material circumstances. Though microphenomenological accounts of political culture are better at addressing nonmaterial motivation, they too fail to account for the isomorphism found by so many of the world polity researchers. This is clearly a circumstance where political sociology has something to gain form World Society theory.

Meyer et al also address several characteristics of the World Society that they believe enhance the impact of world cultural forces. They point to the increasing connectedness of nations through organizations like the U.N., the proliferation of international non-governmental organizations (INGOs), and the ascendancy of rationalized scientific and professional authority. They believe these increased associations as well as the presence of a common rationalized understanding of the world greatly favors diffusion of world cultural models. Thomas and Boli’s (1997) book exploring the influence of INGOs on all manner of sociopolitical phenomena is a prime example of the growing body of evidence in favor of this view. These characteristics lend further support to many theories of globalization and the decline in importance of the nation-state.

Though Meyer and colleagues often talk about the World Society or world culture as if they were monolithic entities, they specifically acknowledge that world culture is dynamic and varied. Unlike Parson’s view of culture as “the ultimate independent variable”, Meyer et al draw attention to characteristics of the World Society that increase its cultural dynamism such as multiple levels of legitimate actors (i.e. supra-, inter-, and intra-national organizations) and the inconsistencies and contradictions inherent in world culture. To understand how world cultural models carry inherent contradictions, consider that most nations are dedicated to ideals that often come into conflict (e.g. equality vs. freedom, standardization vs. diversity, progress vs. justice).

From the evidence and analysis presented above, I believe it is clear that World Society theory has much to offer to political sociology. Though as I noted above, it should be considered an augmentation rather than a substitution. Previous research from Lipset (1959) to Huber and Stephens (2001) has firmly established the importance of materialist and political economic factors at both the national and international level. Microphenomenological accounts have also shown their usefulness in a explaining a wide range of phenomena (e.g. Almond and Verba; Snow et al). World Society theory is simply another tool in our scholarly toolbox, and an especially useful one at that.