It is not something we think about, but our entire world is eurocentric. Even when we claim to be fighting against European imperialism, we are doing it in European languages. For instance, the Pan Africanist who writes anti-imperialist books is most likely writing them in English. The Middle Easterner who is fighting against European neocolonialism is almost certainly educated in a European university. I am writing this on a computer using Microsoft Word. Both the PC and the software were developed in those parts of the world.
I will stop using European, I will use Western.
Perhaps because of this western outlook, we rarely remember a time when the west did not rule the world. On the grand scale of things, Western Rule is a recent phenomenon. Yes. It is just as recent as 300 years ago. If you were alien visiting earth in the 1400s, you will want to visit China more than you will want to visit England. England was a backwater. It was that century third world. Hard to believe right? Actually, it is so. (Personally, I began to experience a washing away of the Eurocentric view of history when I read Peter Frankopan's âThe Silk Roadsâ and then âWhy The West Rules For Nowâ by Ian Morris. I recommend both books). In 1400, China had already developed the gun powder, paper, the printing machine, it already sent emissaries that traveled all the paths that will eventually lead to the New World. It had an encyclopedia that was larger than anything in the world. In fact, nothing will beat it until 2007 when Wikipedia beat it. It had cleaner cities, had the most competitive exams in the world, the most sophisticated government bureaucracy, and the richest people in the world at the time. It surely must have been one of the most sophisticated civilizations.
But if China, in 1500 was already way superior to Western Civilization, what happened? Why did the backward West, become the dominant civilization in the world? How did Britain, a small island nation go on to conquer half of the world? How did America, a former colony, become the world's sole superpower in the 21st century?
These must have been ganguantum changes! Niall Ferguson answers these questions by providing six answers. He calls them the six killer apps of western civilization! I couldnât disagree with any single one of them.
One of the easiest answers to give is to say the west imposed itself on others or to say that they used guns and warfare to conquer terrorists. Thatâs only half the answer. In the war between the West and Africa, why did the west win? Why was it that it was America, under Commodore Perry that forced Japan to open not Japan that forced America to open up? Africa and Japan were warring societies too, they had armies. And in many cases, there were battles. So, shooting the answer of saying the west used to war, is only half an answer, for all regions were warring too. So, the question is, why was it that it was America, Britain, France, Spain, Russia, etc that won in those fights.
The six killer apps of western civilization;
1. Competition, in that Europe itself was politically fragmented and that within each monarchy or republic there were multiple competing corporate entities
2. The Scientific Revolution, in that all the major seventeenth-century breakthroughs in mathematics, astronomy, physics, chemistry and biology happened in Western Europe
3. The rule of law and representative government, in that an optimal system of social and political order emerged in the English-speaking world, based on private property rights and the representation of property-owners in elected legislatures
4. Modern medicine, in that nearly all the major nineteenth- and twentieth-century breakthroughs in healthcare, including the control of tropical diseases, were made by Western Europeans and North Americans
5. The consumer society, in that the Industrial Revolution took place where there was both a supply of productivity-enhancing technologies and a demand for more, better and cheaper goods, beginning with cotton garments
6. The work ethic, in that Westerners were the first people in the world to combine more extensive and intensive labour with higher savings rates, permitting sustained capital accumulation.
What is particularly instructive is that any country or group that adopted these killer apps eventually became as successful as western societies. The first to do that was Japan. The Meiji Restoration was basically the westernization of Japan. What is remarkable is that it succeeded and turned Japan into a prosperous society. And even worse, it made Japan an imperial society. Now, this brings me to the real core issue I have with western civilization, Ferguson didnât shy away from it. The logical conclusion for the competition is that one will always want his interest first. This often means not a consideration for others who are less powerful than you. Thatâs what led to colonialism, thatâs what led to the First and Second World Wars. It is important to say that all civilizations have various lapses.
There is no denying it, the world today is a western world. It came with many gifts, and then with its own evil.
Think about the fact that in 1800, 43% of people died before the age of 5. Today, it is 4%. For most of history, people were actually poor. Yes, poverty was the norm, so the norm that Jesus said âYou will always have the poor amongst youâ. Today, there are more people outside the poor category than ever before in history. In China alone, nearly 700 million people were lifted out of poverty in the past 30 years alone. (China is using, competition, work ethic, a particularly western thing to develop itself).
Niall makes the argument that Western Civilization has changed the world for good. You cannot take that away from this work. At the same time, we have to remind him, that in some cases western civilization caused destructions that are irreparable. Good for Ferguson, he didnât shy away from that in this work.
If you are interested in understanding how the west came to rule, this is a book you have to read! Niall did excellent work and makes a persuasive argument for what he believed.