Modernization and development theory

The modernization and development tradition emerged during the Cold War as the West&s;s economic, political, social, and cultural response to the management of former colonial territories. The dilemma facing Western scholars and practitioners of international politics was twofold. Overall, the modernization and development tradition promises that, under the right social, political, and economic conditions, difference will give way to social, political, economic, and cultural sameness, with Third World states modernizing and developing to become more like First World states. Samuel Huntington is not a first-wave modernization and development theorist. He is a modernization revisionist. What this means is that while he accepts the basic principles, values, and arguments of modernization and development theory, he has devoted himself to the refinement and correction of some of the ideas in this tradition. Huntington has no shortage of answers to these questions, which is to be expected since his thesis seems to hinge on these issues.