g. unindustrialized or newly independent post-colonial nations). Modernization can thus be an evolutionary movement of technological progress or a reaction to the past and a new template for the future. However, we must understand that it is both a continuous, and open-ended, process. It is not the type of social change in which there is a clear beginning, middle and end; but rather a movement towards equilibrium on a scale that is constantly changing. Historians, for instance, tend to link modernization to the process of urbanization and industrialization, as well as the spread of compulsory education throughout a population based in this view, humans come together in cities for a variety of reasons: safety, job specialization, etc. And then move technologically forward until much of their society is mechanized and there is then...

In critical sociological theory, modernization is linked more to the more cognitive process of rationalization. This process holds that as modernization (especially technical acuity) increases within a society, the role of the individual begins to take on far more importance, and eventually replaces the family, the extended family, and even the community as the fundamental change agent for society (Roberts & Hite (eds.) 2000).
The idea of development equaling modernization is not new to the 20th century, even though the popularization did not really occur until decolonialization post-World War II. In fact, Aristotle suggested that states follow a natural pattern of growth, much like plants and biological entities.