CONVERGENCE THEORIESprograms across capitalist and communist nations
(Armour and Coughlin 1985).
Other researchers have challenged the idea of
convergence in the welfare state. In a historical
study of unemployment programs in thirteen West-
ern European nations, Alber (1981) found no
evidence that programs had become more alike in
eligibility criteria, methods of financing, or gener-
osity of benefits, although he did find some evi-
dence of convergence in duration of unemploy-
ment benefits in nations with compulsory systems.
A study conducted by O’Connor (1988) testing the
convergence hypothesis with respect to trends in
welfare spending from 1960 to 1980 concluded
that ‘‘despite the adoption of apparently similar
welfare programmes in economically developed
countries there is not only diversity but divergence
in welfare effort. Further, the level of divergence is
increasing’’ (p. 295). A much broader challenge to
the convergence hypothesis comes from studies
focusing on variations in welfare-state develop-
ment among western capitalist democracies. Hewitt
(1977), Castles (1978, 1982), and Korpi (1983), to
cite a few leading examples, argue that variations
across nations in the strength and reformist char-
acter of labor unions and social democratic par-
ties account for large differences in the levels of
spending for and redistributive impact of welfare-
state programs. However, the disagreement among
these studies and scholars arguing for conver-
gence may be simply a function of case selection.
For example, in a study of nineteen rich nations,
Wilensky (1976, 1981) linked cross-national diver-
sity in the welfare state to differences in ‘‘demo-
cratic corporatism,’’ and secondarily to the pres-
ence of Catholic political parties, thus rejecting
the simplistic idea that the convergence observed
across many nations at widely different levels of
economic development extends to the often diver-
gent policy developments in the relatively small
number of advanced capitalist societies.
The debate over convergence in the welfare
state is certain to continue. A major obstacle in
resolving the question involves disagreement on
the nations chosen for study, selection and con-
struction of measures (see Uusitalo 1984), and
judgments about the time frame appropriate for a
definitive test of the convergence hypothesis.
Wilensky et al. (1985, pp. 11–12) sum up the mixed
status of current research on convergence in wel-
fare-state development as follows:
Convergence theorists are surely on solid
ground when they assert that programs to
protect against the seven or eight basic risks of
industrial life are primarily responses to
economic development .... However, showing
that societies have adopted the same basic
programs... is only a partial demonstration of
convergence insofar as it does not demonstrate
convergence in substantive features of the
programs or in the amount of variation among
affluent countries compared to poor countries.GLOBALIZATIONGrowing attention to a variety of large-scale changes
in economic relations, technology, and cultural
relations, broadly subsumed under the descrip-
tion ‘‘globalization,’’ has inspired renewed inter-
est in the ideas of convergence and modernity (see
Robertson 1992 for a critical account). The litera-
ture on globalization has several threads. One
approach focuses on the economic and cultural
impact of transnational capitalist enterprises that
are judged to be responsible for the spread of a
pervasive ideology and culture of consumerism
(Sklair 1995). Ritzer (1993) summarizes this phe-
nomenon as the ‘‘McDonaldization of society’’—a
broad reference to the ubiquity and influence of
the consumer brand names (and the large corpo-
rate interests behind them) that are instantly rec-
ognizable in virtually every country in the world
today. The main implication of this perspective is
that indigenous industries, habits, and culture are
rapidly being driven aside or even into extinction
by the ‘‘juggernaut’’ of the world capitalist econo-
my dominated by a relatively few powerful interests.Meyer et al. (1997) provide a different inter-
pretation of globalization in their work on ‘‘world
society.’’ Although they argue that ‘‘many features
of the contemporary nation-state derive from a
worldwide model constructed and propagated
through global cultural and associational process-
es’’ (pp. 144–145), the essence of their position is
that nations are drawn toward a model that is
‘‘surprisingly consensual.. .in virtually all the do-
mains of rationalized social life’’ (p. 145). Meyer et
al. contend that various core principles, such as
those legitimating human rights and favoring
environmentalism, do not emerge spontaneously
as an imperative of modernity, but rather diffuse