World history

World history, global history or transnational history (not to be confused with diplomatic or
international history) is a field of historical study that emerged as a distinct academic field in the
1980s. It examines history from a global perspectie. It is not to be confused with comparatie
history, which, li!e world history, deals with the history of multiple cultures and nations, but does
not do so on a global scale.
"orld #istory loo!s for common patterns that emerge across all cultures. "orld historians use a
thematic approach, with two ma$or focal points% integration (how processes of world history hae
drawn people of the world together) and difference (how patterns of world history reeal the
diersity of the human experience).
Organization
&he adent of world history as a distinct academic field of study can be traced to 1980s,'1( and was
heralded by the creation of the "orld #istory )ssociation and of graduate programs at a handful of
uniersities. *er the next decades scholarly publications, professional and academic organi+ations,
and graduate programs in world history proliferated, although the "#) is still predominantly an
)merican phenomenon.',( "orld #istory has often displaced "estern -iili+ation in the re.uired
curriculum of )merican high schools and uniersities, and is supported by new textboo!s with a
world history approach.
&he "orld #istory )ssociation publishes the Journal of World History .uarterly since 1990.'/( &he
#0"orld discussion list'1( seres as a networ! of communication among practitioners of world
history, with discussions among scholars, announcements, syllabi, bibliographies and boo! reiews.
&he international 2ociety for the -omparatie 2tudy of -iili+ations I2-2- approaches world
history from the standpoint of comparatie ciili+ations. 3ounded at a conference in 1941 in
2al+burg, )ustria, that was attended by *thmar )nderlie, 5itirim 2oro!in, and )rnold &oynbee, this
is an international association of scholars that publishes a $ournal, -omparatie -iili+ation 6eiew,
and hosts an annual meeting in cities around the world.
History
Pre-modern
&he study of world history, as distinct from national history, has existed in many world cultures.
#oweer, early forms of world history were not truly global, and were limited to only the regions
!nown by historian.
In )ncient -hina, -hinese world history, that of -hina and the surrounding people of 7ast )sia,
was based on the dynastic cycle articulated by 2ima 8ian in circa 100 9-. 2ima 8ian:s model is
based on the ;andate of #eaen. 6ulers rise when they united -hina, then are oerthrown when a
ruling dynasty became corrupt.'<( 7ach new dynasty begins irtuous and strong, but then decays,
proo!ing the transfer of #eaen:s mandate to a new ruler. &he test of irtue in a new dynasty is
success in being obeyed by -hina and neighboring barbarians. )fter ,000 years 2ima 8ian:s model
still dominates scholarship, although the dynastic cycle is no longer used for modern -hinese
history.'4(
In )ncient =reece, #erodotus (<th century 9-), as founder of =ree! historiography.,'>( presents
insightful and liely discussions of the customs, geography, and history of ;editerranean peoples,
particularly the 7gyptians. #oweer, his great rial &hucydides promptly discarded #erodotus:s all0
embracing approach to history, offering instead a more precise, sharply focused monograph, dealing
not with ast empires oer the centuries but with ,> years of war between )thens and 2parta. In
6ome, the ast, patriotic history of 6ome by ?iy (<9 9-01> )@) approximated #erodotean
inclusienessA'8( 5olybius (c.,000c.118 9-) aspired to combine the logical rigor of &hucydides
with the scope of #erodotus.'9(
In -entral )sia, &he 2ecret #istory of ;ongols is regarded as the single significant natie
;ongolian account of =enghis Bhan. &he 2ecret #istory is regarded as a piece of classic literature
in both ;ongolia and the rest of the world.
In the ;iddle 7ast, )la:iddin )ta0;ali! Cuayni (1,,4D1,8/) was a 5ersian historian who wrote an
account of the ;ongol 7mpire entitled &a: rE!h0i $ahFn0gushF (#istory of the "orld -on.ueror).'10(
&he standard edition of Cuayni is published under the title &a: rE!h0i $ahFn0gushF, ed. ;ir+a
;uhammad 8a+wini, / ol, =ibb ;emorial 2eries 14 (?eiden and ?ondon, 191,D/>). )n 7nglish
translation by Cohn )ndrew 9oyle G&he #istory of the "orld0-on.uerorG was republished in 199>.
6ashEd al0@En 3adhl0allFh #amadFnE (1,1>D1/18), was a 5ersian physician of Cewish origin,
polymathic writer and historian, who wrote an enormous Islamic history, the Cami al0&awari!h, in
the 5ersian language, often considered a landmar! in intercultural historiography and a !ey
document on the Il!hanids (1/th and 11th century).'11( #is encyclopedic !nowledge of a wide
range of cultures from ;ongolia to -hina to the 2teppes of -entral 7urasia to 5ersia, the )rab
lands, and 7urope, proide the most direct access to information on the late ;ongol era. #is
descriptions also highlight the manner in which the ;ongol 7mpire and its emphasis on trade
resulted in an atmosphere of cultural and religious exchange and intellectual ferment, resulting in
the transmission of a host of ideas from 7ast to "est and ice ersa.
*ne )rab scholar, Ibn Bhaldun (1//,01109) bro!e with traditionalism and offered a model of
historical change in Muqaddimah, an exposition of the methodology of scientific history. Ibn
Bhaldun focused on the reasons for the rise and fall of ciili+ation, arguing that the causes of
change are to be sought in the economic and social structure of society. #is wor! was largely
ignored in the ;uslim world.'1,( *therwise the ;uslim, -hinese and Indian intellectuals held fast
to a religious traditionalism, leaing them unprepared to adise national leaders on how to confront
the 7uropean intrusion into )sia after 1<00.
Early modern
@uring the 6enaissance in 7urope, history was written about states or nations. &he study of history
changed during the 7nlightenment and 6omanticism. Holtaire described the history of certain ages
that he considered important, rather than describing eents in chronological order. #istory became
an independent discipline. It was not called philosophia historiae anymore, but merely history
(historia).
=iambattista Hico (1448D1>11) in Italy wrote Scienza nuova seconda (&he Iew 2cience) in 1>,<,
which argued history as the expression of human will and deeds. #e thought that men are historical
entities and that human nature changes oer time. 7ach epoch should be seen as a whole in which
all aspects of cultureJart, religion, philosophy, politics, and economicsJare interrelated (a point
deeloped later by *swald 2pengler). Hico showed that myth, poetry, and art are entry points to
discoering the true spirit of a culture. Hico outlined a conception of historical deelopment in
which great cultures, li!e 6ome, undergo cycles of growth and decline. #is ideas were out of
fashion during the 7nlightenment, but influenced the 6omantic historians after 1800.
) ma$or theoretical foundation for world history was gien by =erman philosopher =. ". 3. #egel,
who saw the modern 5russian state as the highest stage of world deelopment.
Contemporary
"orld history became a popular genre in the ,0th century with uniersal history.
In the 19,0s seeral best0sellers dealt with the history of the world, including sureys The Story of
Mankind (19,1) by #endri! "illem an ?oon and The Outline of History (1918) by #.=. "ells.
Influential writers who hae reached wide audiences include #. =. "ells, *swald 2pengler, )rnold
C. &oynbee, 5itirim 2oro!in, -hristopher @awson,'1/( and ?ewis ;umford. 2cholars wor!ing the
field include 7ric Hoegelin,'11( "illiam #. ;cIeill and ;ichael ;ann.'1<(
2pengler:s Decline of the West (, ol 1919D19,,) compared nine organic cultures% 7gyptian (/100
9-01,00 9-), Indian (1<00 9-01100 9-), -hinese (1/00 9-0)@ ,00), -lassical (1100 9-0100
9-), 9y+antine ()@ /00D1100), )+tec ()@ 1/00D1<00), )rabian ()@ /00D1,<0), ;ayan ()@
400D940), and "estern ()@ 900D1900). #is boo! was a smashing success among intellectuals
worldwide as it predicted the disintegration of 7uropean and )merican ciili+ation after a iolent
Gage of -aesarism,G arguing by detailed analogies with other ciili+ations. It deepened the post0
"orld "ar I pessimism in 7urope, and was warmly receied by intellectuals in -hina, India and
?atin )merica who hoped his predictions of the collapse of 7uropean empires would soon come
true.'14(
In 19/4D19<1, &oynbee:s ten0olume Study of History came out in three separate installments. #e
followed 2pengler in ta!ing a comparatie topical approach to independent ciili+ations. &oynbee
said they displayed stri!ing parallels in their origin, growth, and decay. &oynbee re$ected 2pengler:s
biological model of ciili+ations as organisms with a typical life span of 1,000 years. ?i!e 2ima
8ian, &oynbee explained decline as due to their moral failure. ;any readers re$oiced in his
implication (in ols. 1D4) that only a return to some form of -atholicism could halt the brea!down
of western ciili+ation which began with the 6eformation. Holumes >D10, published in 19<1,
abandoned the religious message, and his popular audience slipped away, while scholars gleefully
pic!ed apart his mista!es.,'1>(
;cIeill wrote The !ise of the West (194<) to improe upon &oynbee by showing how the separate
ciili+ations of 7urasia interacted from the ery beginning of their history, borrowing critical s!ills
from one another, and thus precipitating still further change as ad$ustment between traditional old
and borrowed new !nowledge and practice became necessary. ;cIeill too! a broad approach
organi+ed around the interactions of peoples across the globe. 2uch interactions hae become both
more numerous and more continual and substantial in recent times. 9efore about 1<00, the networ!
of communication between cultures was that of 7urasia. &he term for these areas of interaction
differ from one world historian to another and include "orld#system and ecumene$ "hateer it is
called, the importance of these intercultural contacts has begun to be recogni+ed by many scholars.
'18(
History education
United States
In college curricula of the Knited 2tates, world history became a popular replacement for courses on
"estern -iili+ation, beginning in the 19>0s. 5rofessors 5atric! ;anning, preiously of
Iortheastern Kniersity and now at the Kniersity of 5ittsburgh:s "orld #istory -enterA and 6oss
7. @unn at 2an @iego 2tate are leaders in promoting innoatie teaching methods.'19(
Recent themes
In recent years, the relationship between )frican and world history has shifted rapidly from one of
antipathy to one of engagement and synthesis. 6eynolds (,00>) sureys the relationship between
)frican and world histories, with an emphasis on the tension between the area studies paradigm and
the growing world0history emphasis on connections and exchange across regional boundaries. )
closer examination of recent exchanges and debates oer the merits of this exchange is also
featured. 6eynolds sees the relationship between )frican and world history as a measure of the
changing nature of historical in.uiry oer the past century.',0(
#istories hae traditionally been written from the perspectie of national goernments or of geographically
based communities. #oweer, it is also possible to see world history as the story o a single human
ci!ilization de!eloping new institutions and orms o e"pression o!er successi!e periods o time# World
history can thus be a $creation story% to tell how the world o human society de!eloped ##
In this mode, the story would include not only political and diplomatic history but also eents
relating to religion, commerce, education, and entertainment. &echnologies of communication
would hae an important role in this history. ',1(
World historians
-hristopher 9ayly, The %irth of the Modern World& 'lo(al )onnections and )omparisons,
*+,-.*/*0 (?ondon, ,001)
5hilip @. -urtin (19,,0,009), The World and the West& The 1uropean )hallen2e and the
Overseas !esponse in the 2e of 1mpire$ (,000) /08 pp. I29I 9>8000<,10>>1/<01. online
reiew

-hristopher @awson. (1889019>0) !eli2ion and the !ise of Western )ulture(19<0) excerpt
and text search

3rancis 3u!uyama (19<,D ) The 1nd of History and the 3ast Man (199,)',,(
=eorg "ilhelm 3riedrich #egel (1>>0D18/0), philosopher of world history',/(
"illiam ;c=aughey, 4ive 1pochs of )ivilization (,000).',1(
"illiam #. ;cIeill (born 191>)A',<( see especially &he 6ise of the "est% ) #istory of the
#uman -ommunity 5*/678
;cIeill, 6obert, and "illiam #. ;cIeill. The Human We(& %ird9s#1ye :ie" of World
History (,00/) excerpt and text search

5atric! ;anning, ;avi2atin2 World History& Historians )reate a 'lo(al <ast (,00/)',4(
-arroll 8uigley (1910019>>), The 1volution of )ivilizations (1941), Tra2edy and Hope&
History of the World in Our Time (1944), Weapons Systems and <olitical Sta(ility& History
(198/)
5itirim 2oro!in (1889D1948), 6ussian0)merican macrosociologyA Social and )ultural
Dynamics (1 ol., 19/>D11)',>(
*swald 2pengler (1880019/4), =ermanA Decline of the West (1918D,,) ol 1 online

A ol , online

A excerpt and text search, abridged edition

5eter 2tearns, K2)A World History in %rief& Ma=or <atterns of )han2e and )ontinuity, >th
ed. (,009)A 1ncyclopedia of World History, 4th ed. (,00pp)
?uc0Iormand &ellier, -anadianA >r(an World History, 5K8, (,009), 4<0 pagesA online
edition

)rnold C. &oynbee, 9ritishA Study of History (19/1D41)A',8( see especially Study of
History.
7ric Hoegelin (1901D198<) Order and History (19<4D8<)',9(
Immanuel "allerstein, world systemsA leftist but not ;arxist
"ill @urant (188<01981) and )riel @urant (189801981)A Story of )ivilization(19/<019><).
&he Changing Shape o World History
'y William H# (c)eill* Uni!ersity o Chicago* Emeritus
Paper originally presented at the $History and &heory World History Conerence* (arch +,-
+.* /001
#istories of the portion of the earth !nown to the writer are properly classed as world histories
inasmuch as they see! to record the whole significant and !nowable past. 9y that standard,
therefore, #erodotus and 2su0ma -hen were world historians as well as founders of their respectie
historiographical traditions. )mong the =ree!s, howeer, &hucydides promptly discarded
#erodotus: discursie, all0embracing approach to history, offering instead a pridefully accurate.
sharply focused monograph, dealing with twenty seen years of war between )thens and 2parta.
&hese alternatie models remained normatie throughout =reco06oman anti.uity. ?iy:s ast,
patriotic history of 6ome approximated #erodotean inclusienessA and 5olybius may hae
deliberately aspired to combine the logical rigor of &hucydides with the scope of #erodotus.
&hough impossible to e.ual, &hucydides: precision was easier to imitate than #erodotus:
inclusieness, and most =reco06oman historians accordingly inclined towards the monographic,
political0military focus that &hucydides so magnificently exemplified.
Cewish sacred scripture elaborated a different historical ision, according to which )lmighty =od
goerned all peoples, eerywhere, whether they !new it or not. 3or about a millennium, defeats
suffered by successie Cewish states made such a ision of human history im0 plausible to
unbelieersA but -hristianity, when it emerged to dominance within the 6oman empire in the fourth
century ).@., brought to the fore a modified, expanded, but fundamentally Cewish, and entirely
=od0 centered, iew of 'pg. ,( history. -hristians subordinated secular pagan to sacred 9iblical
history, and thereby reersed the balance between #erodotean and &hucididean formats for history,
since, from Cewish and -hristian points of iew, all history was world history, being part of =od s
plan for human!ind.
&he -hristian eposJ-reation, Incarnation and @ay of CudgmentJowed nothing to pagan
historiography, but -hristian historians. from 7usebius (d. /10) and *rosius (d. 11>) onwards, felt
compelled to fit bits and pieces of the pagan record into their histories of how =od had dealt with
human!ind. Innumerable medieal chronicles, therefore, begin with -reation. and hurry through
familiar landmar!s of the 9iblical and pagan past in order to attach local and recent eentsJat least
perfunctorilyJto the central, sacred meaning of human experience on earth. #istory, detached from
=od:s purposes, was blind, pointless, misleadingA and for something li!e a thousand years,
-hristians refused to consider such folly, een though their most painsta!ing recording of recent
eents left =od:s purposes stubbornly inscrutable.
In -hina, no such transformation of preailing iews eer too! place. Instead, 2su0ma -hen:s ision
of how to write and understand history preailed from his own time until the collapse of the
;anchu dynasty at the beginning of the twentieth century. &he central idea was that #eaen chose
irtuous hereditary rulersA and allowed (or contried) their oerthrow wheneer a ruling dynasty
became corrupt. 7ach new dynasty began irtuous and strong only to decay, sooner or later,
proo!ing the transfer of #eaen:s mandate to a new ruler, whose irtue was attested by his
practical success in reducing -hina and surrounding barbarians to obedience. &he power of 2su0ma
-hen:s ision is attested by the fact that his dynastic frame for -hinese history still dominates
scholarship, een among westerners, who 'pg. /( hae neer belieed that the ruler:s personal irtue
assured supernatural support.
;oslem, 9uddhist and #indu outloo!s upon history also too! shape during the ;iddle )ges. In
general, these learned traditions paid less attention to history than -hristians and -hinese didA but
all agreed on the oerriding importance of supernatural interention in human affairsA and by
subordinating eents of earth to =od:s will, as ;oslems did, or to supernal processes and
interentions, as 9uddhists and #indus did, all agreed that world history was the only meaningful
!ind of history, since supernatural entities goerned human affairs along with the rest of unierse
according to rules of their own.
-onsensus concerning the decisie role of transcendant beings or forces in history was challenged
when a discordant, man0centered ersion of history found oice in Italy soon after 1<00. "hat
inspired the new type of history was the palpable conergence of Italian city0state politics with
patterns of =ree! and 6oman anti.uity. 2tudy of pagan writers in priileged circles of a few Italian
towns reied as this conergence became eidentA and by about 1<00 such studies had ripened
sufficiently to allow ;acchiaelli (d. 1<,0) and =uicciardini (d. 1<10) to reaffirm the autonomy of
human actions by writing local, monographic and entirely secular histories in the &hucydidean
mould. &hey deried their inspiration unabashedly from pagan writers, and settled accounts with the
9iblical framewor! of uniersal history simply by leaing =od out, not mentioning #im as an actor
in history at all.
&his was both shoc!ing and unacceptable to most 7uropeans. )ccordingly, a renaissance man li!e
"alter 6aleigh (d. 1418) in 7ngland, and, almost a century later, the pious and elo.uent 9ishop
9ossuet (d. 1>01) in 3rance, reaffirmed the centrality of sacred history and attempted to weae what
'pg. 1( they !new about the 9iblical and pagan past into a more perfect whole. &heir wor!s
remained incomplete and neer approached their own time% partly because both were bogged down
by a rapidly increasing fund of !nowledge about eents of the more recent past, and partly because
=od:s will remained obscure (or at least radically disputable) when called on to explain the tangled
record of those same eents.
;eanwhile, a flood of information about the )mericas and other formerly un!nown parts of the
earth assaulted 7uropean consciousness. ) few gestures towards fitting the newly discoered
peoples into the inherited -hristian frame of history were indeed made. In particular, how the
inhabitants of )merica descended from the sons of Ioah became a sub$ect of debate. 9ut for the
most part, 7uropean learning reaffirmed (or at least paid lip serice to) -hristian truthsA explored
new fields of !nowledge, accumulated more and more information about the past, and about far
parts of the earth, and dodged the .uestion of how to fit all the new data together. &his remained the
case until the 18th century when radical efforts to organi+e empirical !nowledge systematically
(stimulated partly by Iewton:s spectacular success in physics and astronomy) began to meet with
apparent success in such fields as botany.
In these same centuries, the -hinese, ;oslem and Indian traditions of learning were far more
successful in resisting challenge from without, improing upon the 7uropeans by refusing to pay
attention to new and discrepant information. "hen a few self0styled L7nlightened thin!ers, located
mainly in 3rance, began to abandon the inherited -hristian framewor! of !nowledge entirely,
guardians of inherited truth in )sia were not impressed. Instead, serious efforts to come to grips
with what eentuaity 'pg. <( became undeniably superior 7uropean !nowledge and s!ills were
delayed until almost our own time.
)gainst this norm, the olatility of 7uropean learning in general and of historiography in particular
should perhaps excite our wonder. )t the least, we ought not to scorn the centuries0long lag time
needed to accommodate new and discrepant information. "e in the historical profession persist in
the same behaior today, remaining for the most part content to wor! (often unconsciously) within a
liberal, nineteenth century interpretation of history whose principles, if oertly affirmed, would
embarass most of us because we no longer beliee them.
Hico (d. 1>11), Holtaire (d. 1>>8), =ibbon (d. 1>91) and #erder (d. 180/) pioneered the eighteenth
century effort to improe upon the inherited 9iblical frame of history. 7ach in his own way
desacrali+ed the past, een though both Hico and #erder remained -hristians. ?i!e =uicciardini and
;achiaelli, they assumed that human will and actions shaped eentsA unli!e their 3lorentine
predecessors they undertoo! macrohistory, finding largescale patterns in the past, whether cyclical,
as Hico and #erder did, or cumulatie and, at least sporadically progressie, as =ibbon and Holtaire
did. -lassical history and philosophy played a central role in shaping their outloo!s. *nly Holtaire
in his 1ssai surs les Moeurs (1><4) paid much attention to non07uropeansA and his praise for -hina
and his respect for ;oslems was largely inspired by his distaste for the -hristian church. #ence
nothing li!e a global iew of the past emerged from eighteenth century efforts to correct the
-hristian interpretation of historyA but the autonomy of human action was igorously affirmed, with
or without an ultimate, increasingly distant, @iine control.'pg. 4(
&his compromise between pagan and -hristian heritages carried oer into the nineteenth century,
when the liberal ision of history too! shape. &his is what still lur!s in the bac!ground of
contemporary )merican historiography &he core idea was simple enough% what mattered in history
was the sporadic but ineluctable adance of 3reedom. &his allowed nationalistic historians to erect a
magnificently 7urocentric ision of the human past, since 3reedom (defined largely in terms of
political institutions) was uni.uely at home among the states of 7urope, both in ancient and in
modern times. &he rest of the world, accordingly, $oined the mainstream of history when
discoered, settled or con.uered by 7uropeans. ) somewhat spurious global history was easy to
construct along these lines. 2till, for the first time )merica, )ustralia, )frica and )sia found an
admittedly subordinate but still significant place in world history, and the entire alobe became a
theater for the adance of human 3reedom.
"ithin the 7uropean past, attention focused on times and places where 3reedom flourished or faced
critical challenge. -lassical anti.uity, the barbarian inasions, the rise of representatie institutions
in the ;iddle )ges, 6enaissance and 6eformation, the 7nlightenment and all lhe magnificent
adances of the nineteenth century were what desered to be studiedA eras of dar!ness and
despotism could properly be s!ipped oer since they made no contribution to the main stream of
human achieement.
&he Knited 2tates, of course. en$oyed a specially priileged place in this ersion of history, since
the 6eolution of 1>>4 and the -onstitution of 1>89 were beacons of 3reedom:s adanceA and the
expansion of )merican wealth and power in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries offered an
e.ually obious example of the rewards 3reedom could bring to its faithful and faored
practitioners. &his, as I say, is still the scheme that underlies most 'pg. >( professional study of
history in the Knited 2tates, een though some rebels hae turned eerything inside out by ma!ing
the wic!edness of 7uropean aggression against other peoples the main theme of modern history,
while attac!ing the white male establishment of the Knited 2tates for its no less wic!ed exploitation
of arious subordinated populations, both at home and abroad.
*biously enough, this liberal, progressie iew of world history (as well as the inside0out
inersion thereof) was a naie seculari+ation of the -hristian epos. 3reedom replaced =od as the
goerning, supernal actorA and priileged free peoples played the terrestrial role assigned to faithful
-hristians in the diine drama of salation. Insofar as the professional pursuit of history finds its
meaning in this schemes (or in its inersion) we clearly remain bounded by the -hristian
inheritance, howeer faint it has become in contemporary consciousness.
"orld "ar I was hard to accommodate within what I hae called the liberal iew of history.
3reedom to lie and die in the trenches was not what nineteenth century historians expected liberal
political institutions to result in. ;oreoer, the agoni+ing years of stalemate seemed to many
participants to arise from circumstances entirely independent of human will or intention. 2pengler
and &oynbee were the two most significant historians who responded to this apparent loss of
control, and to the strange disembowelment that 3reedom suffered in "orld "ar I. &he sense of
being caught up in processes oerriding to human purposes, and of reenacting in 191101918
struggles for power li!e those that had wrac!ed ancient =reece and 6ome, persuaded first 2pengler
and then &oynbee that human history could best be understood as a more or less foreordained rise
and fall of separate ciili+ations, each recapitulating in essentials the career of its 'pg. 8(
predecessors and contemporaries. 8uite consciously, they both drew on their classical education to
reaffirm a cyclic ision of human affairs proposed by 5lato and elaborated by other philophers of
anti.uity down to the 2toics, and applied to history by such dierse writers as 5olybius and Hergil.
&heir impressiely learned boo!s won wide attention between 1918 when the first olume of
2pengler:s Der >nter2an2 des (endlandes was published, and 19/40<1, when &oynbee:s ten
olume Study of History came out in three separate installments. &o many thoughtful persons,
their boo!s gae a new and somber meaning to such unexpected and distressing eents as "orld
"ar I, =ermany:s collapse in 1918, the onset of "orld "ar II, and the brea!up of the ictorious
=rand )lliances after both wars.
&oday, when these political resonances hae faded, a .uite different aspect of their wor! seems
more important (at least to me), since, by cycling through the recorded past, 2pengler and &oynbee
put 7uropean and non0 7uropean ciili+ations on the same plane. &his was a real change from the
myopic concentration on the glories of 7urope:s past that had preailed in the nineteenth centuryA
and, at least potentially, distinguishes the historiography of our age from its predecessors.
&o be sure, &oynbee was not long satisfied with his initial scheme, and in the later olumes of
Study of History (published in l9/9 and l9<1) explicitly reintroduced =od as an actor in history,
subordinating the rise and fall of separate ciili+ations to a progressie reelation of =od:s will that
came to sensitie souls in times when the moral rules of a gien ciili+ation were undergoing
irremediable brea!down. &his way of combining linear and cyclical macrohistory and of
introducing =od once more into public affairs won few adherents among historiansA and after 19<>
his reputation suddenly collapsed, as 2pengler:s had before him.'pg.9(
*ne empirical (and probably triial) reason for this swing of public and professional attention was
that the separate ciili+ations that 2pengler and &oynbee had declared to be unable to communicate
with one another, (sae for &oynbee at special sensitie moments in their deelopment), did in fact
interact with one another wheneer contacts occurred. )daptation to borrowings across
ciili+ational boundaries was especially important in technological, artistic and military matters,
where the charms of noelty and the rewards of innoation were particularly obious. 9y contrast,
literary learning resisted intrusion from afar, partly because mastering an alien language in which
interesting ideas might be set forth was always difficultA but also because to admit that outsiders had
something to say that was worth attending to seemed a confession of inade.uacy that faithful
transmitters of a reered literary canon were not prepared to ma!e. Ionetheless, defenders of
literary and religous truth sometimes borrowed ideas from outsiders, with or without
ac!nowledeging alien inspiration.
-ultural and technological borrowings were often incidental to economic exchanges, which hae
the adantage for historians of leaing material traces behind een when literary records are
missing. ?ong distance trade existed een before the beginning of recorded history, when the rier
alley ciili+ations of ;esopotamia and 7gypt began to import strategic goods li!e metal and
tlmber across .uite considerable distances from barbarian lands. Inter0ciili+ational trade, too, was
ery old. ;esopotamian commercial contacts with lndia dated bac! to the third millennium 9.-. or
before. Indirect and far more tenuous contacts between ;esopotamia and -hina started a few
hundred years later, though caraans only began to moe more or less regularly across the oases of
central )sia about 100 9.-. Ieertheless, with the passage of time, the scale and range of trade 'pg.
10( exchanges within 7urasia expanded into )frica and then, after 1<00, began to embrace all the
inhabited earth.
#istorians hae, a bit hesitantly, begun to react to the increasing e!idence o long distance
interactions that cross the boundaries o traditional scholarly specialization A and a number of
persons hae set out to construct a more ade.uate world history than 2pengler and &oynbee
enisaged by highlighting 7urasian and subse.uent global interactions. Io one writer stands
preeminent in this company, which is diided between those who put primary emphasis on
economicsJoften ;arxists or .uasi0;arxists li!e Immanuel "allerstein and )ndre =under 3ran!
Jand others who thin! that religious, artistic, and scientific encounters played an autonomous and
more or less e.ual part with economics and technology in defining the course of 7urasian and then
of world history. I count myself in this company, but can also point to such figures as 6oss @unn,
the first 5resident of the "orld #istory )ssociation, and the company of scholars associated with
the International 2ociety for -omparatie 2tudy of -iili+ations, among whom Cohn #ord and
@aid "il!inson are among the most igorous. &he ery existence of these two organi+ations, each
with its own learned $ournal, attests to the lieliness that world history has attained in )merican
academic circlesA and, as a sign of their igor, both $ournals are presently fumbling around in search
of a more ade.uate conceptuali+ation of human history as a whole.
&o be sure, terminological confusion is as dense as eer. Met een though there is no perceptible
consensus about what the term :ciili+ation: ought to mean, and no agreed word or phrase to
describe the :interactie +one: (to use a phrase introduced, I beliee, by 6oss @unn) embracing
different 7urasian ciili+ations, I thin! it correct to assert that recognition o the reality and
'pg.11( historical importance o trans-ci!ilizational encounters is on the increase and promises
to become the mainstream o uture wor2 in world history. "e badly need a word or phrase to
describe the human reality arising from encounters with strangers who bring locally unfamiliar
s!ills and !nowledge to the attention of stay0at0homes. 6oss @unn s :interactie +one: seems
clumsy. ;y own faorite, :ecumene,: carries cramping ecclesiastical associations. "allerstein:s
:world system: is perhaps the leading candidate at presentA but it is aw!ward as a description of such
relationships before 1<00, when separate world systems existed in 7urasia, )merica and
presumably elsewhere as well, although we !now ery little about historical change initiated by the
non0literate peoples: interactions, and can only hope that sophistocated archaeology may someday
ma!e some of the facts accessible.
2till, een though we hae yet to agree upon what to call it, the fact that ciili+ed and unciili+ed
peoples communicated across relatiely long distances from ery early times, and altered their
behaior from time to time in response to encounters with attractie or threatening noelties from
afar seems more and more obious. It follows that world history ought to be constructed around
this reality3 the largest and most inclusi!e ramewor2 o human e"perience* and the lineal
ancestor o the One World in which we ind oursel!es so conusingly immersed today#
"hat I propose, therefore, in the balance of this paper, is to s!etch landmar!s in the history of the
interactie, ecumenical world system of 7urasia, hoping that een a thumb nail s!etch may clarify
the concept, and promote the emergence of more coherent, intelligible approach to world history.
"hen I wrote The !ise of the West I set out to improe upon &oynbee by showing how the separate
ciili+ations of 7urasia interacted from the ery beginning of their history, borrowing critical s!ills
from one another, and thus precipitating still further change as ad$ustment between treasured old
and borrowed new !nowledge and practice became necessary.
;y ideas about the importance of cultural borrowing were largely shaped by social anthropology, as
deeloped in the Knited 2tates in the 19/0s. -lar! "issler had studied the diffusion of :culture
traits: among the 5lains Indians with elegant precisionA and 6alph ?inton:s textboo!, The Tree of
)ulture, adduced other persuasie examples of far0reaching social change in )frica and elsewhere
as a result of cultural adaptation to some borrowed s!ill. 9ut the man who influenced me most was
6obert 6edfield. #e constructed a typology of human societies, setting up two ideal types% fol!
society at one extreme, ciili+ed society at the other.
3ol! society was one in which well established customs met all ordinary circumstances of life, and
fitted smoothly together to create an almost complete and un.uestioned guide to life. 6edfield
argued that a remote Mucatan illage he had studied approached his ideal type of fol! society.
Iearly isolated from outside encounters, the people of the illage had reconciled their 2panish
-hristian and ;ayan heritages, blending what had once been conflicting ways of life into a more or
less seamless whole. -onflict and change were reprehensible, chec!ed by the sacrali+ing power of
binding custom.
-iili+ed society, exemplified by Mucatan:s port city of ;erida, was at the opposite pole. &here
-atholicism clashed with residual pagan ritesA and continual contacts among strangers meant that
customary ruies binding eeryone to a consistent body of behaior could not arise. Instead, 'pg. 1/(
conflicting moral claims proo!ed ariable, upredictable conduct. 2ocial conflict and change was
obious and perasie. feared by some and welcomed by others.
)rmed with ideas li!e these, it seemed obious to me in 19<1 when I began to write The !ise of the
West that historical change was largely proo!ed by encounters with strangers, followed by efforts
to borrow (or sometimes to re$ect or hold at bay) specially attractie noelties. &his, in turn, always
inoled ad$ustments in other established routines. ) would0be world historian therefore ought to be
alert to eidences of contacts among separate ciili+ations, expecting ma$or departures to arise from
such encounters wheneer some borrowing from (or re$ection of) outsiders: practices proo!ed
historically significnt social change.
&he ultimate spring of human ariability, of course, lies in our capacity to inent new ideas,
practices and institutions. 9ut inention also flourished best when contacts with strangers
compelled different ways of thin!ing and doing to compete for attention, so that choice became
conscious, and deliberate tin!ering with older practices became easy, and indeed often ineitable. In
fol! society, when custom wor!ed as expected, obstacles to most sorts of social change were all but
insuperable. 9ut when clash of customs created confusion, inention flourished. -iili+ation, as
6edfield defined it, was therefore auto0catalytic. *nce clashing cultural expections arose at a few
cross0roads locations, ciili+ed societies were liable to !eep on changing, ac.uiring new s!ills,
expanding their wealth and power and disturbing other peoples round about. &hey did so down to
our own day, and at an eer increasing pace as the centuries and millennia of ciili+ed history
passed. 'pg.11(
)pproaching the conceptuali+ation of world history in this fashion, separate ciili+ations became
the main actors in world historyJaccepting or re$ecting new ways come from afarA but in either
case, altering older social practices, since successfully to re$ect an attractie or threatening noelty
might re.uire changes at home .uite as far reaching as trying to appropriate it, *er time,
ciili+ations clearly tended to expand onto new groundA and as they expanded, autonomous
neighboring societies were engulfed and eentually disappeared. 2uch geographical expansion
meant that in the ancient Iear 7ast what had begun as separate ciili+ations in ;esopotamia and
7gypt eentually merged into a new cosmopolitan whole, beginning about 1<00 9.-.A and, I
concluded, an analogous cosmopolitanism began to embrace all the ciili+ations of the earth after
about 18<0, when the effectie autonomy of -hina and Capan came to an end.
9ut when I wrote The !ise of the West I was sufficiently under &oynbee:s spell to note these
instances without dierting the focus of my attention from the separate histories of separate
ciili+ations. &he idea of a 7urasian (eentually also )frican and then global) ecumenical whole,
embracing all the peoples, ciili+ed and unciili+ed, who were interacting with one another, dawned
ery slowly. *nly after I coninced myself, while writing &he <ursuit of <o"er (198,), that
-hinese commercial expansion energi+ed the sudden upthrust of trade in ?atin -hristendom after
about 1000 ).@., did I reali+e, with "allerstein and @unn, that a proper world history ought to
focus primarily upon changes in the ecumencial world system, and then proceed to fit deelopments
within separate ciili+ations, and within smaller entities, li!e states and nations, into the pattern of
that fluctuating whole. 'pg. 1<(
) wea!ened sense of the autonomy of separate ciili+ations went, along with thls alteration of my
outloo!. In The !ise of the West, I had defined ciili+ation as a style of life, to be recogni+ed by
s!illed and experienced obserers in the way an art critic discerns styles of art. 9ut that analogy is
not a good one. "or!s of art are tangibleA whereas :life: is too multifarious to be obsered in the way
art critics can obsere and more or less agree about stylistic affinities. In particular. within any
ciili+ation. different groups lied in ery different ways. "hat principally held them together was
their common sub$ection to rulers, whose continued dominion was much assisted by the fact that
they subscribing to a set of moral rules, embodied in sacred or at least semi0sacred texts. &his, it
now seems to me, is the proper definition of a :ciili+ation.: 6ulers who !new how to behaeJ
paying lip serice to prescribed canons of conduct and acting with a more or less exactly agreed
upon disregard of the letter of those rulesJcould and did cooperate smoothly enough to !eep a lid
on turbulent subordinates for centuries on end across scores, then hundreds and, eentually,
thousands of miles. 5riileged ruling classes thus constituted a sort of iron framewor! within which
a ciili+ation could thrie. 9ut among subordinated groups widely dierse local, occupational, and
sectarian ways of life preailed. )ll that united them was the fact that each group had some sort of
tacit (or, occasionally, explicit) understanding with other groups, and especially with the politically
dominant segments of society, so that they could act as they did without suffering too many nasty
surprises.
In such a iew, ciili+ations become rather pale, inchoate entities in themseles. Internal diersity
looms large and merges almost imperceptibly into the diersity of neighboring peoples who retained
arying degrees of local autonomy but still entered into negotiations with ciili+ed rulers and 'pg.
14( traders, and, mayhap, with missionaries, craftsmen, refugees and, sometimes with coloni+ing
settlers as well. Io single recogni+able style of life can be imputed to such a social landscape.
@iersity, conflict and imprecise boundaries, yesA coherence and uniformity, no.
7en the canon of sacred writings. to which dominant segments of ciili+ed society subscribed, was
full of discrepancies. -onsider the 9ible, 9uddhist and #indu sacred writings, and the -onfucian
classicsN It re.uired $udicious commentary to educe a practicable guide to life from such dierse
materialsA and, of course, initial diersity implied perennial flexibility, initing commentators to
ad$ust to eer0altering circumstances by appropriate reinterpretation, age after age, while claiming,
characteristically, to be restoring the true, original meaning to the sacred texts. &his was the primary
function of the literate (often priestly) classesA and explains why new, discrepant, data was (and still
is in many branches of learning) so persistently disregarded.
If ciili+ations were as internally confused and contradictory, as I now beliee them to hae been, it
puts them ery much in tune with the confusion and complexity of the 7urasian ecumenical world
system. &hat system was larger in geographic area, of course, and more attenuated in its internal
structure, being without any articulated oerriding canon of conduct because it embraced a plurality
of ciili+ations (and interstitial peoples), each with its own literary definition of moral principles
and its own political and cultural rulers. 9ut, for all that, the ecumene was not so ery different
from the diersity to be found within the borders of any of the larger ciili+ations that by 1<00 were
participating in the 7urasian and )frican circle of exchange and interaction. 'pg. 1>(
&he reason was that mercantile practice had, in fact, slowly created a wor!able code of conduct that
went a long way towards standardi+ing encounters across cultural boundaries. 7en the arcanum of
religion made room for outsiders and unbelieers, since the principal religions of the 7urasian
worldJ-hristianity, -onfucianism, 9uddhism and IslamJall agreed in exhorting the deout to
treat strangers as they would wish to be treated themseles. &hus, despite the fact that no single set
of rulers had eer exercised political soereignty across the whole 7urasian0)frican ecumene, a
bare0bones moral code did arise that went a long way towards reducing the ris!s of cross0
ciili+ational contact to bearable proportions. ?ittle by little across the centuries, local rulers of
eery stripe learnt that they could benefit mightily by taxing instead of plundering strangers.
2ubordinate classes also learned to tolerate outsidersJeen alien merchants, whom hardwor!ing
peasants and artisans regularly regarded as dishonest exploiters who reaped profit un$ustly, since
what they sold dear was exactly the same as what they had preiously bought cheap from honest
men, i.e., from themseles. )ll the same, the poor gradually got used to being cheated by outsiders
in the mar!etplace, $ust as their forerunners at the dawn of ciili+ation had gotten used to
surrendering unre.uited rent to self0 appointed, strong armed landowners.
)s these attitudes became general, so that an enforcible (and remar!ably uniform) law merchant
arose in the ports and other great urban centers of 7urasia, and was supplemented by an informal
body of customs for dealing with strangers that extended into the rural hinterland, the structure of
the ecumenical world system approximated ery closely to that of the separate ciili+ations
embraced within it. )ccordingly, students of world history should ma!e it the ob$ect of conscious
inestigation, for this is what gies 'pg. 18( cohesion and structure to their sub$ect in .uite the same
way that goernmental acts and policies gie cohesion and structure to national histories. *r so I
now beliee.
"hat, then, were the ma$or landmar!s in the historical eolution of this, the largest and, eentually,
world0dominating framewor! of human experienceO
)s one would expect, if I am right in claiming that encounters with strangers were the main drie
wheel of social change, the earliest complex societies arose on the rier flood plains of
;esopotamia, 7gypt and northwest India, ad$acent to the land bridge of the *ld "orld, where the
largest land masses of the earth connect with one another. -ontinental alignments and climatic
conditions made this region the principal node of land and sea communications within the *ld
"orld, and it was presumably for that reason that ciili+ation first bro!e out there.
2umerian literary tradition accords with this notion, since it held that the founders of their
ciili+ation had come by sea from the south and subdued the :blac! headed people: who were
indigenous to the ban!s of the lower &igris07uphrates. &he newcomers eentually learned to irrigate
the swamp lands that bordered the riers, and than!s to regular and assured harests were then able
to erect earth:s first cities on an alluial plain that lac!ed timber, metals and other essential raw
materials the 2umerians needed. 3rom their inception, therefore, shipping, supplemented by
oerland caraans, !ept the cities of the ;esopotamian plain in touch (directly or indirectly) with
distant sources of raw materials and dierse peoples liing within a radius of seeral hundred miles.
)nd, ere long, inhabitants of 7gypt and of the Indus alley erected ciili+ations of their owns than!s
partly to 'pg. 19( borrowed s!ills and ideas ac.uired through contact with ;esopotamia, and by
doing so promptly established their own +ones of interaction with peoples round about, $ust as the
2umerians had done before them.
Initially, water transport was the main lin! across long distances. "hen, at an early but un!nown
date, human beings discoered the use of sails, the coastal waters of the Indian ocean and its
ad$acent seas became an especially easy medium of transport and communication. "inds blew
e.uably throughout the year, and their direction reersed itself with each monsoon. &his made safe
return from lengthy oyages exceptionally easy, een for ships that could not sail against the wind.
If 2umerian tradition is to be belieed, the founders of the world:s first ciili+ation emerged from
this sea0room, bringing with them superior s!ills that had been accumulated, we may surmise,
before the dawn of recorded history than!s to contacts with strangers proo!ed by sea trael.
)bout 1000 9.-. sailing ships also began to ply the ;editerranean, where comparably benign
(though not .uite so conenient) sailing conditions preailed in summer time when the trade winds
blew gently and steadily from the north east. 2afe return to home base often re.uired going against
the preailing wind. 6owing was one possibility, and remained important in ;editerranean
naigation until the seenteenth century ).@. &a!ing adantage of short0lied off0shore winds
created by differential heating or sea and land was another possibility. 2hip and sail design that
permitted tac!ing into the wind was a more satisfactory solution, but was not fully attained until the
late middle ages. Met ships that moed up0wind with difficulty, and could not sail the stormy seas of
winter safely. were .uite enough to proo!e and sustain the emergence of ;inoan, 5hoenician 'pg.
,0( -arthaginian and =reco06oman ciili+ations. 9orrowings trom 7gypt and 2yria were critical at
the startJand most such contacts were by sea.
=eographically spea!ing, the south -hina sea was about as hospitable to early sailing ships as the
;editerranean. 9ut the possibility of seasonal naigation in south east )sia and among ad$acent off0
shore islands did not lead to the early deelopment of cities and literate ciili+ations, perhaps
because no deeloped ciili+ed centers were at hand from which to borrow critical s!ills and ideas.
2imilarly, the most congenial sea spaces of all the earth were the ast trade wind +ones of the
)tlantic and 5acific oceansA but they too were not exploited until large ships that could tac! against
the wind had been inented, though 5olynesian canoes did carry human settlers to remote islands of
the 5acific throughout the trade wind +one. &he Iorth )tlantic and Iorth 5acific were far more
formidable for early sailors since stormys ariable winds were further complicated by the high
tides.
&hus climate and wind patterns set definite limits to early shipping, though it is worth noting that
small coracles, made of wic!erwor! and hides, did begin to fish the coastal waters of the Iorth
)tlantic in the third millennium 9.-. 3ishermen also embar!ed from the shores of Capan from an
un!nown but presumably early date. )ccidental drift oyages across the breadth of the oceans must
hae set in as soon as fishing boats started to enture onto these stormy waters. @rift oyages of
7s!imo !aya!s from =reenland that fetched up in 2cotland in the seenteenth century, and Capanese
fishermen who came ashore in *regon in the nineteenth century offer a well attested sample of the
random, ocean0crossing dispersals suffered by small craft lost at sea.
) few resemblances between )merindian artifacts and those of east )sia may result from drift
oyagesA but fishermen did not carry much cultural 'pg. ,1( baggage with them, een when they
suried wee!s of exposureA and it is unli!ely that the real but triial trans0oceanic contacts
(including Iorse settlements in Iorth )merica) had enduring conse.uences of any importance
before 119,. Instead, a separate ecumenical system arose in the )mericas, centered in ;exico and
5eruA but in the absence of an extended literary record we !now far less abut its deelopment. and,
since archaeology is inherently local, connections among separate sites fre.uently remain obscure.
7urasian ecumenical history is far more accessible, een though historians hae not yet studied its
growth and consolidation in detail. Ionetheless, it is clear enough that the initial primacy of sea
transport and communication in holding the ecumene together was gradually modified by
improements in transport oerland. #uman beings, of course, were roers from the start% that is
how they populated the earth. "ith the deelopment of agriculture, the diffusion of useful crops set
in. 2lash and burn cultiators, for example, carried wheat from the Iear 7ast to -hina, where it
arried before ,*** 9.-. 6ice spread from somewhere in south east )sia and became an
important crop in both India and -hina about a thousand years later. *ther, less important crops
spread as well, altering human life profoundly whereer they began to proide a new source of food
for the population.
9efore the dawn of literacy, human portage and wandering had been supplemented, at least in some
parts of the world, by caraans of pac! animals, which made carrying goods much easier. ?ong
distance exchange became routine in 2umerian times, when don!ey caraans brought metals and
other precious commodities from as far away as the -arpathian mountains of 6umania and
distributed textiles and other manufactured goods in return. -araan trade thus came to resemble
trade by sea, with the 'pg. ,,( difference that carrying aluable goods through inhabited lands
re.uired the negotiation of protection rents with eery local ruler, whereas ships usually only had to
pay tolls at their ports of destination. 2ince ris! of plunder by some local ruffian was far higher than
the ris! of piracy at sea, costs of caraan transport remained comparatiely high, so that only
precious goods could bear the cost of long distance land transport.
*erland contacts too! a decisie new turn after about 1>00 9.-. when light, manoeuerable
chariots were inented somewhere in the ;esopotamian borderlands. ) team of horses hitched to
such a ehicle could carry drier and bowman across open country faster than a man could runA and,
when new, an array of charging chariots proed capable of oerwhelming opposing infantry with
ease. )s a result, charioteers oerran the rier alley ciili+ations of the Iear 7ast and India before
and after 1<00 9.-. *thers penetrated 7urope and -hina, where the earliest archaeologically well0
attested -hinese dynasty, the 2hang, established itself about 1100 9.-. with the help of war
chariots. )s the spread of wheat (and of some pottery styles from western )sia) shows, swift
wheeled transport and the military superiority of charioteers that resulted did not initiate trans0)sian
encountersA but the establishment of the 2hang dynasty through the exploitation of military
techni.ues that originated in the ;esopotamian borderiands apparently did inaugurate many of the
historical forms or -hinese ciili+ation. &his is stri!ingly attested by inscriptions on oracle bones
discoered at the 2hang capital of )nyang which are directly ancestral to the characters of
contemporary -hinese writing.
-ommunication between -hina and western )sia remained sporadic and indirect for many centuries
after 1100 9.-. 7en when -hinese imperial initiatie inaugurated more or less regular caraan
trade after 100 9.-., 'pg. ,/( goods that suried the long $ourney remained mere curiosities and
expensie luxuries. ) few fashionable 6oman ladies did indeed clothe themseles in semi0
transparent sil!s from -hinaA and the -hinese emperor did succed in importing large0boned ::blood
sweating:: horses from Iran, only to find that the scrawny steppe ponies, with which -hinese
soldiers had already come to terms, were so much hardier and cheaper to !eep that the imported
breed could not displace them for anything but ceremonial purposes.
Met the inauguration of more or less regular caraan trade across )sia did connect east and west as
neer beforeA and when, after about /00 ).@., camels were brought into general use, caraans
became capable of crossing preiously inhospitable deserts. &he effect was to incorporate ast new
areas of 7urasia and )frica into an expanded trade and communications networ!. &ibet, )rabia and
the oases of central )sia, on the one hand, and sub02aharan "est )frica on the other entered firmly
into the ecumenical system, which simultaneously expanded northward by penetrating the whole of
the steppes from ;anchuria to #ungary, and een filtered across mountain passes and along rier
courses into the forested fastnesses of northern 7urope.
Iew and highly lethal epidemic diseases and the so0called higher religions were the two most
significant noelties that spread through this expanded caraan world from shortly before the
-hristian era to about 1000 ).@. ;aterial exchanges, li!e the spread of south east )sian fruits and
other crops to the ;iddle 7ast with the elaboration of oasis agriculture, or the diffusion of =reco0
6oman naturalistic sculptural styles to India, -hina and een Capan were triial by comparison with
the epidemiological and religious changes that this transport system precipitated. 'pg. ,1(
&his balance between economicPtechnological and culturalPbiological exchanges altered after about
1000 ).@. when the ecumenical world system began to respond to innoations within -hina that
expanded the role of mar!et behaior by bringing poor peasants and urban wor!ing classes within
its scope for the first time. "hat made this possible was cheap and reliable transport within -hina,
resulting from widespread canal construction. ;ost canali+ation was initialty underta!en to regulate
water supplies for the expanding carpet of rice paddies upon which -hina:s food more and more
depended. &hen with the construction of the =rand -anal in 40<, lin!ing the watershed of the Mang0
tse with the Mellow rier system, accompanied and followed by other engineering wor!s designed to
facilitate naigation through the Mang0tse gorges and other critical bottlenec!s, the most fertile parts
of -hina came to be lin!ed by easily accessible and easily naigable waterways. Knder the distant
soereignty of the 7mperor, canal boats could carry comparatiely bul!y cargoes across hundreds
of miles with minimal ris! of shipwrec! or robbery. &his, in turn, meant that een small differences
in price for commodities of common consumption made it worth while for boatmen to carry such
goods from where they were cheap to where they were dear.
&hen, when, soon after 1000, the 2ung goernment found it more conenient to collect taxes in cash
instead of in !ind, as had always been done preiously, common people, including the poorest
peasants, were forced onto the mar!et so as to be able to pay their taxes. &his enormously
accellerated the spread of mar!et behaior throughout -hina. &hereupon, to the general surprise of
officialdom, whose -onfucian training classified traders as deplorable social parasites, the
adantages of speciali+ed production, which )dam 2mith was later to analy+e so persuasiely,
started 'pg. ,<( to come on stream throughout the aried landscapes of -hina. "ealth and
productiity shot upwards. Iew s!ills deeloped ma!ing -hina the wonder of the rest of the world,
as ;arco 5olo and other isitors from afar soon reali+ed. )mong the new -hinese s!ills, some
proed reolutionary% most notably, for 7urope, the trinity of gunpowder, printing and the compass,
all of which reached 7urope from -hina between the thirteenth and fifteenth centuries.
-hina:s westward reach was enhanced by the deelopment of ocean0going all0weather ships,
capable of tac!ing against the wind and of suriing most storms. 2uch ships, based mainly along
the south -hina coast, where inland canal construction was chec!ed by the mountainous interior,
allowed enterprising merchants to extend a new (or perhaps only intensified and expanded) trade
networ! across the south -hina sea and into the Indian ocean. &here stoutly0built -hinese essels
had to compete with the light craft and experienced mercantile population indigeneous to those
waters. )s happened subse.uently, when 7uropean ships penetrated the Indian ocean by
circumnaigating )frica, local shipping and trading networ!s proed capable of undercutting the
higher costs borne by large, all0weather, stout0built intruders. 9ut all the same, a comparatiely
massie infusion of -hinese commodites and -hinese demand for spices and other Indian ocean
products gae a fillip to the mar!ets of the southern seas that soon slopped oer into the
;editerranean and helped to stimulate the remar!able reial of 7uropean trade in the eleenth
century and subse.uently, with which historians hae long been familiar.
&raders: needs, in turn, proo!ed 7uropeans to deelop all0weather ships that were capable of
traersing the stormy, tide0beset seas of the Iorth )tlantic and hae a reasonable chance of getting
bac! to home ports safely. 'pg. ,4( Inentions introduced between about 1000 and 1100 such as
double plan!ing nailed to a heay !eel0and0rib frame, powerful stern post rudders, dec!ed0oer
holds, and multiple masts and sails made this possible. 7uropean ship building followed a course of
its own, independent of -hinese or any other foreign model, een though 7uropean sailors were
always ready to borrow anything that wor!ed in practice, li!e compass naigation coming from
-hina and triangular sails coming from the Indian ocean.
&heir most fateful borrowing and adaptation, howeer, was the marriage 7uropean seamen made
between stout0built, ocean0going ships and cannon, deeloped initially to !noc! down castle walls
on land. 2uch big guns, once adapted for use on shipboard, proided 7uropean ships with an
armament far superior to anything preiously !nown. )s a result, when 7uropean ships began to
sail across all the oceans of the earth, $ust before and after 1<00, they were remar!ably safe against
attac! by seaA and could often oerwhelm local reisistance on shore with wall0destroying
broadsides.
&he recoil from such guns was so powerful that only heay ships could sustain it without sha!ing
apart. &he -hinese might hae matched 7uropean ships in this respect, but for reasons domestic to
imperial politics, the -hinese goernment prohibited the construction of ocean0going ships after
11/1, and made priate -hinese oceanic enterprise illegal. *perating as pirates systematically
handicapped -hinese (and Capanese) sailors thereafter and depried them of any chance or arming
their essels with heay guns li!e those 7uropean traders carried routinely.
&he conse.uences of 7uropean oceanic discoeries are well !nown, as are the conse.uences of the
extraordinary improements of transport and communication that came after 18<0, when 7uropean,
)merican and more recently also Capanese inentors utili+ed mechanical and electrical forms of
'pg. ,>( energy for railroads steamships, telegraph and then for airplanes, radio, &H and, most
recently, for the transmission of computer data as well. &he most obious effect of these successie
transformations of world communciations was to expand the reach of the 7urasian ecumene
throughout the globe, engulfing the preiously independent ecumenical system of )merica, together
with less well0!nown social complexes in )ustralia and in innumerable smaller islands. &he shoc!
was enormous, and the world is still reerberating to the ecological, epidemiological, demographic,
cultural and intellectual conse.uences of the global unification of the past fie hundred years.
)mong other things, global communication and transport made world history a palpable reality.
#istorians, being the faithful guardians of eery leel of human collectie identity, are beginning to
adapt to that circumstance, almost half a millennium after it began to affect human life eerywhere.
&hat is why this conference was calledJa bit belatedly one might suppose. Met that is not really the
case, since, as I pointed out al0 ready, the historical profession still clings to more local (and more
sacred) forms of history, and has not yet agreed upon how to approach the human adenture on
earth as a whole.
In struggling with this .uestion, it seems appropriate to emphasi+e two distinct leels of human
encounters that too! place across the centuries within the communications networ!s I hae $ust
s!etched for you. 3irst is biological and ecological% how human beings fared in competition with
other forms of life, managing to not only to surie but to expand their share of the earth:s matter
and energy, age after age, and in a great ariety of different physical enironments. Io other species
comes near to e.ualling humanity:s dominating role in earth:s ecosystem. ;a$or landmar!s are 'pg.
,8( obious enough, starting with initial diffusion of hunters and gatherers from )frica, followed by
intensified broad0spectrum gathering leading to agricultureA and then the rise of ciili+ations with
enhanced formidability is a is other societies due to their military specialists on the one hand and
their adaptation to crowd diseases on the other. &he growing importance of the 7urasian ecumenical
world system then ta!es oer, diffusing diseases, crops, technological s!ill across larger and larger
areas, until after 1<00 the process became global. 7ach time a preiously isolated population
entered into contact with the ecumenical world system debilitating exposure to unfamiliar diseases,
ideas and techni.ues ensuedA often with disastrous results for the preiously isolated peoples and
their cultures.
Kniformity neer emerged, and there is no reason to suppose it eer will. @ifferences of climate and
other circumstances re.uire different behaior, and being both intelligent and adaptible, human
beings act accordingly. 2ome forms of life hae been destroyed by the human career on earthA many
more are endangered, as we all !now. *thers hae been carried into new enironments and made to
flourish as neer before. 2ome disease organisms and weed species still defy human wishes
successfullyA but domesticated plants and animals hae been radically altered and some entirely
new species of plants and animals hae been inented to nourish us and sere our wants (and
wishes) in other ways.
"hat ma!es the human career on the face of the earth so extraordinary from a biologicalPecological
point of iew is that in becoming fully human our predecessors introduced cultural eolution, as
soon as learned behaior began to goern most of their actiity. &he conse.uent cultural attainments
of human!ind, and their ariabiiity in time and space, thus constitute the second leel of world
history. )ttention has traditionally and .uite properly 'pg. ,9( centered here because what has been
learned can change wheneer something new and attractie comes to conscious attention. )nd since
consciousness is extremely motile, cultural eolution immediately outstripped organic eolution,
introducing a radically new sort of disturbance into earth:s ecosystem.
Met in some respects cultural eolution still conforms to the older patterns of organic eolution.
Initial, more or less random ariation and subse.uent selection of what wor!s best is enough to set
the process in motion. -ontacts among bearers of different cultural traditions promoted further
changeA but as I hae argued already, changes were often initiated to defend local peculiarities
rather than to accept what was perceied as an alien, and often threatening, noelty. It follows that
een the instantaneous communication that preails today is unli!ely to result in any sort of global
uniformity. #uman groups, een while borrowing from outsiders, cherish a !een sense of their
uni.ueness. &he more they share, the more each group focuses attention on residual differences,
since only so can the cohesion and morale of the community sustain itself.
&he upshot has always been conflict, rialry and chronic collision among human groups, both great
and small. 7en if world goernment were to come, such rialries would not cease, though their
expression would hae to alter in dererence to the oerrlding power or a bureaucratic world
administration. In all probability, human genetic inheritance is attuned to membership in a small,
primary community. *nly so can life hae meaning and purpose. *nly so can moral rules be firm
and definite enough to simplify choices. 9ut membership in such groups perpetuates the gap
between :us: and :them: and inites conflict since the best way to consolidate any group is to hae an
enemy close at hand. 'pg. /0(
Kntil ery recently, rural illages constituted the primary communities that shaped and gae
direction to most human lies. 9ut with modern communciations and the persistent spread of
mar!et relations into the countryside, this has begun to change. ;ultiple and often competing
identities, characteristic of cities from ancient times, hae begun to open before the astonished and
often resentful eyes of the human ma$ority. #ow to choose between the alternatie collectie
identities, and how to reconcile conflicting obligations that different identities impose is the
perennial moral problem of all human society. In the past, most rural communities wor!ed out more
or less unambiguous rules for ma!ing such choices, so that moral behaior was usually obious to
all concerned. In urban contexts, friction and uncertainty were far greaterA and today, as urbanity
expands into the countrysude, ambiguity and uncertainty multiply eerywhere.
#ow to reconcile membership in iacious primary communties with the imperaties of an
emerging cosmopolitanism is, perhaps, the most urgent issue of our time. &he material adantages
of global exchange and economic speciali+ation are enormous. "ithout such a system, existing
human populations could scarcely surie, much less sustain existing standards of liing. 9ut how
firm adhesion to primary communities can be reconciled with participation in global economic and
political processes is yet to be discoered. 6eligious congregations of fellow belieers emerged in
anti.uity in response to analogous needsA and mayhap something similar may happen again. 9ut
contemporary communications expose the faithful to a continual bombardment by messages from
outsiders and unbelieers. ;oreoer, if that could somehow be successfully counteracted, rial
religious communities then might then clash, with resuits as disastrous as those arising from the
twentieth century:s clash of rial nations. 'pg. /1(
I suspect that human affairs are trembling on the erge of rar0reachlng transformation, analogous to
what happened when agriculture emerged out of broad0spectrum gathering, and illage
communities became the principal framewor! within which human lies were led. "hat sort of
communities may proe successful in accommodating their members to global communications,
world wide exchanges and all the other conditions of contemporary (and future) human life remains
to be seen. -atastrophe of unprecedented proportions is always possible. "e are all aware of
potential ecological disasters, due to pollution of land, air and water. 2ocial brea!down due to
deficient or misguided nurture is perhaps no less threatening.
9ut human ingenuity and inentieness remains as liely as eerA and I suppose that satisfying and
sustainable inentions will indeed occur locally and then spread, as other inentions in times past,
haing proed themseles in practice, also spread through imitation and adaptation, thus adding to
the sum of human s!ills and enlarging the scope of human life, age after age, through emergency
after emergency and crisis after crisis, from the beginning of the human career on earth to our time.
6is!s may be greater than eer before, but possibilities are correspondingly ast.
"e lie, whether we li!e it or not, in a golden age when precedents for the future are being laid
down. It seems apparent to me that by constructing a perspicacious and accurate world history*
historians can play a modest but useul part in acilitating a tolerable uture or humanity as a
whole and or all its dierent parts# &he changing shape of world history has been the principal
professional concern of my life. I commend it to you as a worthy and fascinating pursuit, apt for our
age, and practically useful inasmuch as a clear and iid sense of the whole human past can help to
soften future conflicts by ma!ing clear what we all share.
4&he World History 5ssociation is a community o scholars* teachers* and students who are
passionately committed to the study o the history o the human community across regional*
cultural and political boundaries#4
#istory of the "#)
&he "#) is the foremost organi+ation for the promotion of world history through the
encouragement of teaching, research, and publication. It was founded in 198, by a group of
teachers and academics determined to address the needs and interests of what was then a newly
emerging historical sub0discipline and teaching field.
&he new world history emerged out of the shift in higher and secondary education away from a sole
emphasis on national and regional histories toward broader cross0cultural, comparatie, and global
approaches. 9y the 1980s, instructors who had been as!ed to create new courses in this field, as
well as scholars who had already begun laying its theoretical groundwor!, came together in
founding a new type of professional association, one that united the schools and the uniersities,
teaching with research.
2ince then, the "#) has grown four0fold, has garnered accolades for its award winning Cournal of
"orld #istory, and has played a seminal role in shaping the field in the K.2. and around the world.
Important for )merican secondary education, "#) members hae been instrumental in
establishing standards for "orld #istory teaching at the national and state leels as well as
designing the )5 "orld #istory course. )t present, although its membership is still predominantly
Iorth )merican, the "#) is represented in oer /< countries and has an affiliate relationship with
world history societies in 7urope and )ustralia.
;ost important, the "#) brings together uniersity professors, college and community college
instructors, school teachers, graduate students, and independent scholars in a collegial camaraderie
rarely found in more narrowly focused academic and professional societies. 2till motiated by a
larger sense of mission in preparing students and the public for an interdependent world, the "#)
has been uni.ue in bridging the gap between secondary and post0secondary educators.
;ission 2tatement%
&he "#) supports and wor!s to adance scholarship and teaching within a trans0national, trans0
regional, and trans0cultural perspectie. &hrough the researchers, teachers, students, independent
scholars, and authors who are its members, the "#) fosters historical analysis underta!en not from
the iewpoint of nation0states, discrete regions, or particular cultures, but from that of the human
community. &o this end, the "#) supports four different media for the dissemination of the most
up0to0date scholarship and pedagogical adances in the field and sponsors annual public forums for
the exchange and discussion of changing approaches to the study and teaching of world history at
all leels. ;oreoer, as a founding member of the international Ietwor! of =lobal and "orld
#istory *rgani+ations (I*="#I2&*), which was admitted to full membership in the -omitQ
International des 2ciences #istori.ues (-I2#) on ,, )ugust ,010, it wor!s with other associations
across the globe to foster support for research and teaching in world history.
Hision 2tatement%
"ith an enlarged and further diersified membership, professional administration from its
#ead.uarters, and funding ade.uate for its expanded role, the "#) will improe serices for its
members, expand outreach and professional deelopment programs for secondary and college
instruction in world history, stimulate research and publication on world history, and further
internationali+e its scholarly actiities.
What is World History?
5ut simply, world history is macrohistory# 6t is transregional* transnational* and transcultural#
)lthough it is important for students of world history to hae a deep and nuanced understanding
o each o the !arious cultures* states* and other entities that ha!e been part o the !ast mosaic
o human history* the world historian stands bac2 rom these indi!idual elements in that
mosaic to ta2e in the entire picture* or at least a large part o that picture# -onse.uently, the
world historian studies phenomena that transcend single states, regions, and cultures, such as
cultural contact and exchange and moements that hae had a global or at least a transregional
impact. &he world historian also often engages in comparatie history, and in that respect might be
thought of as a historical anthropologist. "orld history is not, therefore, the study of the histories of
discrete cultures and states one after another and in isolation from one another. It is also not
necessarily global history. &hat is, world history is not simply the study of globali+ation after 119,.
)s long as one focuses on the big picture of cultural interchange andPor comparatie history, one is
a practicing world historian. &herefore, for example, a number of noted world historians focus on
trael and cultural exchange within the ast premodern Islamic "orld. *thers study the exchange of
goods, ideas, flora, and fauna across the so0called 2il! 6oad that criss0crossed 7urasia from roughly
,00 9-7 to about 1/<0 -7. *thers concentrate on comparatie holy wars both within and outside
of the )brahamic religions of Cudaism -hristianity, and Islam. 2till others hae chosen to study in
depth the global or transregional impact of single items or classes of items, such as the deelopment
and use of fire arms across the world from anti.uity to the present or the significant roles that such
apparently humble items as cotton and codfish hae played across the ast span of human history.
=ien the current pandemic of )I@2 and the eer0present fear of new pandemics, the role of disease
in human history has also become an important and timely topic of study and teaching.
WH5& 6S WOR78 H6S&OR9:
=oucher, -andice, and "alton, ?inda G"hat is "orld #istoryG essay
written for 9ridging "orld #istory (,001)
5 ;lobal Perspecti!e
"orld history see!s a global perspecti!e on the past, one that
ac!nowledges and integrates the historical experiences of all of the world:s
people. *nly by examining humanity:s shared past is it possible to iew today:s world in
meaningful historical context. ?i!e all historians, world historians create narraties of the past from
records of indiidual and collectie experiences, and they interpret the past in response to .uestions
shaped by the world they lie in.
6ntegration and 8ierence
"orld historians loo! for global patterns that emerge from the world:s ast collection of historical
narraties. In studying patterns historians employ a thematic approach, loo!ing for significant
connections across both time and geographical space. &wo broad themes can be applied to iew the
people and eents of world history% integration (how the processes of world history hae drawn
peoples of the world together) and dierence (how the patterns of world history also reeal the
diersity of the human experience).
&he ery forces that accelerated the integration of the peoples of the world hae also sharpened
awareness of difference among them. &he construction of world history reflects the same global
processes that hae both integrated the experiences of people all oer the world and highlighted
differences among them. "orld history see!s to bridge the tensions between these two dynamic
processes.
World History and Historians
&he study o world history is in itsel a product o history# 6t might be said that it is
humanity<s attempt to ully understand itsel in an age o globalization#
2ince world history, li!e all history, is sub$ect to eer0changing interpretations, it is also an arena of
disagreement and challenge. &he tas! for world historians is to construct an integrated past that
retains !oices o dierence# World history in the +/st century will be created by an on-going
dialogue between the common and collecti!e past and the many indi!idual !oices o memory
that past contains#
&he adent of world history as a discrete field of study was heralded in the 1980s by the
organi+ation of the "orld #istory )ssociation and the creation of graduate programs at a handful
of uniersities. *er the past ,0 years, scholarly publications, professional and academic
organi+ations, and graduate programs in world history hae proliferated, yet the terrain of world
history education remained relatiely undeeloped when compared to other fields.
&eaching and 7earning World History
&he challenge o creating a comprehensi!e starting point or e"ploring world history lies in
the need to deli!er content that relects the multiple perspecti!es o the world<s pasts#
2uccessful approaches to world history must construct a meaningful context t hat re!eals a shared
human past and they must deelop a global framewor! that ma!es the past both releant and
accessible.
=o to the 7ssays and 5apers or *nline 6esources pages for lin!s to articles, papers and additional
resources proiding multiple perspecties on teaching and learning world history.
O)76)E RESOURCES
&he =ournal o World History
@eoted to historical analysis from a global point of iew, the Cournal of "orld #istory features a
range of comparatie and cross0cultural scholarship and encourages research on forces that wor!
their influences across cultures and ciili+ations. &hemes examined include large0scale population
moements and economic fluctuationsA cross0cultural transfers of technologyA the spread of
infectious diseasesA long distance tradeA and the spread of religious faiths, ideas, and ideals.
=o &o "eb 2ite R
World History Connected
"orld history poses extraordinary demands upon those who teach it, challenging the talent of
experienced instructors as well as to those new to the field. "orld #istory -onnected is designed
for eeryone who wants to deepen the engagement and understanding of world history% students,
college instructors, high school teachers, leaders of teacher education programs, social studies
coordinators, research historians, and librarians. 3or all these readers, "#- presents innoatie
classroom0ready scholarship, !eeps readers up to date on the latest research and debates, presents
the best in learning and teaching methods and practices, offers readers rich teaching resources, and
reports on exemplary teaching.
=o &o "eb 2ite R
World History >or Us 5ll
"orld #istory for Ks )ll is a comprehensie model curriculum for teaching world history from
early times to the present. &his curriculum offers middle and high school educators a new,
integratie approach to teaching world history, culture, and geography.
=o &o "eb 2ite R
World History (atters
"orld #istory ;atters, which has been created by the -enter for #istory and Iew ;edia at =eorge
;ason Kniersity, is an online resource center that helps high school and college world history
teachers and their students locate, analy+e, and learn from online primary sources in world history.
&he site contains two main areas% "orld #istory 2ources and "omen and "orld #istory. &hey
include detailed reiews by world history scholars of more than ,00 world history websites that are
directed at helping students and teachers find the best world history materials on the web. Hisitors
to these sites will also find a series of guides to wor!ing with different types of online primary
sources, such as maps, images, or goernment documents. )lso included are interiews with
historians in which they explain how they analy+e different types of sources. 3inally, each site
contains essays by teachers in which they discuss how they teach particular primary sources, such
as the #ue$ot+ingo -odex of 1</1 or women:s trael writing. "omen and "orld #istory, which will
be launched in the fall of ,00<, will also include ,0 lessons plans, with primary sources, for
including women in the world history curriculum. )ll resources on theses sites are free and can be
copied for educational use.
=o &o "eb 2ite R