Looking Back and Forging Ahead: Thirty Years of Social Network Research on the World-system

We review three decades of research linking social network methods with world systems theory. We identify four themes nested within two versions of a general social network methodology—the identification of network Roles and Position. The themes vary by the type of data and the definition of equivalence used to identify roles and positions. Second, we provide a demonstration of the general methodological approach taken in the literature, applying a recent methodological innovation to a newly compiled large global trade dataset. The 1 The first two authors are listed alphabetically to indicate equal authorship. Early versions of the paper were prepared while Paulette Lloyd was a Post-Doctoral Research Associate at the Princeton Institute for International and Regional Studies (PIIRS), and presented at a conference on global trade hosted by the PIIRS in March 2006. She thanks Miguel Centavo and PIIRS for their support. The paper was further developed for a special session on research methods for the study of the world-system at the 2007 annual meeting of the American Sociological Association. Matthew Mahutga thanks the University of California’s Institute for Global Conflict and Cooperation for a grant supporting his work on the paper during this time. We thank Jeffrey Kentor, Timothy Moran, Andrew Jorgenson, Phillip Bonacich and attendees of the Princeton and ASA conferences for helpful comments and suggestions throughout. Please direct all comments and questions to Paulette Lloyd, Department of Sociology, Indiana University, 1020 E. Kirkwood Ave., Room 744, Bloomington, IN 47405, Email: [email protected] or Matthew C Mahutga, Department of Sociology, University of California at Riverside, 1226 Watkins Hall, Riverside, CA, 92521, Email: [email protected]. 49 JOURNAL OF WORLD-SYSTEMS RESEARCH results identify the expected core / periphery interaction pattern, suggesting that it is a fundamental feature of cross-national trade data, regardless of how the data are analyzed. We conclude by suggesting both methodological and substantive directions for future social network research on the world-system.