Why The West Rules - For Now : The Patterns of History and what they reveal about the Future

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  • Lionel Gelber Prize Nominee (2011)
Note: While we do our best to ensure the accuracy of cover images, ISBNs may at times be reused for different editions of the same title which may hence appear as a different cover.

Why The West Rules - For Now : The Patterns of History and what they reveal about the Future

Regular price RM49.55 MYR
Unit price
per
ISBN: 9781846681479
Authors: Ian Morris
Publisher: Profile Books
Date of Publication: 2010-01-01
Format: Hardcover
Related Collections: Economics, Politics, Science, History, Sociology
Goodreads rating: 4.11
(rated by 5487 readers)

Description

There are two broad schools of thought on why the West rules. Proponents of 'Long-Term Lock-In' theories such as Jared Diamond suggest that from time immemorial, some critical factor - geography, climate, or culture perhaps - made East and West unalterably different, and determined that the industrial revolution would happen in the West and push it further ahead of the East. But the East led the West between 500 and 1600, so this development can't have been inevitable; and so proponents of 'Short-Term Accident' theories argue that Western rule was a temporary aberration that is now coming to an end, with Japan, China, and India resuming their rightful places on the world stage. However, as the West led for 9,000 of the previous 10,000 years, it wasn't just a temporary aberration. So, if we want to know why the West rules, we need a whole new theory. Ian Morris, boldly entering the turf of Jared Diamond and Niall Ferguson, provides the broader approach that is necessary, combining the textual historian's focus on context, the anthropological archaeologist's awareness of the deep past, and the social scientist's comparative methods to make sense of the past, present and future - in a way no one has ever done before.
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  • Lionel Gelber Prize Nominee (2011)
Note: While we do our best to ensure the accuracy of cover images, ISBNs may at times be reused for different editions of the same title which may hence appear as a different cover.