Revision summary
Modernisation theory pictured a Western path of social change. Frank and Wallerstein made underdevelopment a product of the world-system. Sen shifted the end from growth to capabilities. Sustainable and movement perspectives pluralised the good. Indian planning, 1991, and SHGs illustrate successive recipes.
Model answer
Copper italics in this answer — like this — are the key facts. Each one is unpacked in the Facts & figures rail.
Introduction
Development perspectives on social change have moved from a single Western path, through critiques of dependency, to human development and alternative ecological paths. Each stage renamed who changes, and toward what.
Body
Modernisation
- After 1945, W. W. Rostow’s stages and Daniel Lerner’s passing of traditional society treated the West as the future.
- Talcott Parsons’s pattern variables supplied a social-system story of achievement and universalism.
- M. N. Srinivas’s Sanskritisation and Westernisation were Indian cousins of a modernisation idiom.
Dependency and world-system
- Andre Gunder Frank argued that underdevelopment is produced by the core, not by missing modernity.
- Immanuel Wallerstein mapped core, semi-periphery, and periphery as a single capitalist world-system.
- Social change is then polarising, not catching up.
Later turns
- Basic needs, then Amartya Sen’s capabilities, shifted the goal from growth to what people can do.
- Sustainable and post-development critiques, and new social movements, questioned industrial change as the only good.
- Indian planning, liberalisation after 1991, and SHG-led micro-inclusion sit on this trajectory as state, market, and community recipes.
Thread
- From evolutionist optimism, to structured inequality, to plurality of ends.
Flow diagram
flowchart TD M[Modernisation Rostow Parsons] --> D[Dependency Frank] D --> W[Wallerstein world-system] W --> H[Human development Sen] H --> A[Alternative ecological]
Conclusion
The trajectory runs modernisation, dependency and world-system, then human and alternative development. Frank and Wallerstein broke the one-path story. Sen and ecological movements changed the meaning of a good change.
Quick related
Students also ask
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Sociologists argue for democratization of science and technology for inclusive development. Comment.
Next question on this syllabus topic (2022 · Q8(a)). View answer →
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Did dependency replace modernisation in policy?
In theory, partly. In policy, growth and FDI often returned. The critique still explains unequal change.
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Is Sanskritisation a development theory?
It is a theory of cultural mobility. It was used inside a modernisation reading of Indian change.
Same topic · past papers
UPSC has asked this before
These previous-year questions sit on the same topic. Open one to practise the earlier ask.
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2017 · Q6(a) · Sociology GS 1 · 20 marks
Trace the changing nature of organisation of work in capitalist society over the years -
2026 · Q1(c) · Sociology GS 1 · 10 marks
Discuss the role of geographical factors in social change and development. -
2026 · Q8(b) · Sociology GS 1 · 20 marks
Critically evaluate the relevance of the cyclical theory of social change in understanding contemporary societies -
2025 · Q5(e) · Sociology GS 1 · 10 marks
To what extent can education and skill development be an agent of social change? Critically analyze. -
2024 · Q5(e) · Sociology GS 1 · 10 marks
Critically examine the roles of science and technology in social change. What is your opinion on their increasing trend in 'online' education and teaching?
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Q8(b) · UPSC Mains 2026 · Sociology GS 1 · 20 marks · Solution
Critically evaluate the relevance of the cyclical theory of social change in understanding contemporary societies
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Q1(c) · UPSC Mains 2026 · Sociology GS 1 · 10 marks · Solution
Discuss the role of geographical factors in social change and development.
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Q5(e) · UPSC Mains 2025 · Sociology GS 1 · 10 marks · Solution
To what extent can education and skill development be an agent of social change? Critically analyze.
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