Introduction

Convergence has been defined in the social sciences as “the tendency of societies to grow more alike, to develop similarities in structures, processes, and performance” (Kerr et al, 1973, p 3). The term is also described as a process in which one unit becomes increasingly similar to other units facing the same environment – what is called ‘institutional isomorphism’ by DiMaggio and Powell (1991) and Lodge (2000), or ‘conditional convergence’ in economic literature. Convergence simultaneously refers to a process and to a final stage. Generally speaking, the final stage is conceived as a stable one, static or dynamic, and without uncertainty. Furthermore, the word is often axiomatically positive because the ultimate objective is widely accepted as enhancing ‘social quality’. After the Second World War, the judgement that the populations of each nation would be entitled to experience rising living standards has pervaded all corners of the globe (Adams and Pigliaru, 1999). Facilitated by modernisation and technical progress as well as the extension of education and so on, ‘convergence’ was conceived as a positive way of evolving towards a golden age, a society of ‘goodness’, and a peaceful and affluent utopia. The idea that societies move towards a condition of similarity is a common feature in a number of academic debates and discussions – for instance, within the various theories governing social change (for example, pre-revolutionary French philosophers and the Scottish moral philosophers, as well as de Tocqueville and others), studies of industrial (Kerr et al, 1973) and ‘post-industrial’ societies, as well as in debates about the ‘post-modernist aspects of contemporary society’ (Coughlin, 2001) and ‘the end of history’ (Fukuyama, 1989). This is fundamentally based on a Darwinian evolutionary perspective of society, because those societies which do not adopt the rules of universalist liberal democratic values are not meant to survive in competition with the liberal model.

Within this general scheme, convergence is often perceived as a more or less long-term trend. Even when divergent features can be noted, the net result or the dominant trend is supposed to be convergent. A supposedly steady evolution also means the denial of any dramatic break in the trend (for example, a revolution, a war or an economic crisis) and hence an essentially unbroken or continual historical process towards peaceful societies, while convergence implies a reduction of uncertainty in daily life. Conversely, divergence suggests a risk of crisis, impoverishment and increasing uncertainty.