Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #232289 in Books
• Published on: 2004-06-03
• Number of items: 1
• Binding: Paperback
• 392 pages

Synopsis
John Hobson challenges the ethnocentric bias of mainstream accounts of the Rise of the West. It is often assumed that since Ancient Greek times Europeans have pioneered their own development, and that the East has been a passive by-stander in the story of progressive world history. Hobson argues that there were two processes that enabled the Rise of the 'Oriental West'. First, each major developmental turning point in Europe was informed in large part by the assimilation of Eastern inventions (e.g. ideas, technologies and institutions) which diffused from the more advanced East across the Eastern-led global economy between 500-1800. Second, the construction of European identity after 1453 led to imperialism, through which Europeans appropriated many Eastern resources (land, labour and markets). Hobson's book thus propels the hitherto marginalised Eastern peoples to the forefront of the story of progress in world history.

Customer Reviews

Demolishes Eurocentric History
A really good read. One of the most important history books I have read. While not everything is original, it puts together a lot of things from other researchers trying to dispell Eurocentric bias-that-is-treated-as-mainstream-history.

While I have read a number of sources that Hobson uses, a reader new to "anti Eurocentric" history might do well to start here and then follow through to the various sources Hobson mentions.

Revealing the Oriental Roots of Occidental History.
In this enthralling work, John M. Hobson attempts, and accomplishes a truly remarkable task: an extensive accounting of the main ways in which the 'East' (non-Western civilizations in the Eastern hemisphere), contributed to the rise of the West. Alongside this primary objective, Mr. Hobson goes on to deflate a number of Eurocentric myths regarding Asian stagnation and Oriental backwardness. The result is a portrayal of a medieval world comprising a number of dynamic civilizations - one that is in some ways, quite similar to our own.

It would be impossible in such a short review to do justice to all the points that Mr. Hobson makes. Three facts should suffice to provide an idea of the book's contents: the Arabs had crossed the Cape of Good Hope before Vasco da Gama and Henry the Navigator; many of the crucial inventions related to Britain's industrial revolution - such as the steam engine and the blast furnace, had been pioneered in China; and as late as the early 19th century, India produced higher quality steel than Britain, - more cheaply as well. In an age where the economic importance of China, India, Japan and OPEC is being increasingly appreciated worldwide, Hobson's work provides us with a timely reminder that this phenomenon is by no means an aberration. Rather it was the earlier European ascendance which was the anomaly.

On this subject however, Hobson's book provides only a partial explanation. Whilst deriding and deflating Eurocentric notions of superior occidental institutions, culture and political systems, he emphasizes the role of imperialism and the slave trade. Such a view is strikingly Anglocentric: Scandinavia did not possess either an empire or a significant share of the slave market - yet it developed. To a lesser extent, the same could be said of Germany and Italy. Whilst Hobson is aware of the role of mercantilist and protectionist policies in the development of the British economy, he does not place much emphasis on their role in the wider rise of the West. This is most unfortunate as they would reduce the role of 'luck' and contingency factors in explaining the ascendance of Western Europe.

It is also regrettable that a book titled 'The Easter Origins of Western Civilization' should contain virtually nothing on the contribution of the Byzantine Empire and of the Orthodox civilization that stretched from Greece to Russia. Hobson seems to ignore this vibrant culture in favour of Islam when discussing the Orient - a serious lapse which his critics may exploit. Certainly, if this Christian, non-Western civilization was included in Hobson's analysis, the Eastern contribution would be even greater.

Whilst discussing European imperialism in the New World, Hobson avoids a tantalizing question: to what extent did Eastern 'resource portfolios' provide the Oriental West with an edge over the civilizations of the Occidental West - i.e. the Mexican (Aztec) and Peruvian (Inca)? Also circumvented is the role of Christianity in fuelling Western imperialism, given that the pagan Nordic navigators who discovered the 'New World' (Leif Ericsson et al.) centuries before Columbus, did not indulge in genocide or empire-building, unlike the Iberian conquistadors. However, such criticisms are only a tribute to the sheer scope of this timely book.

All in all, Hobson's tome is well worth reading alongside Ha-Joon-Chang's 'Kicking Away the Ladder', as radical critiques of liberal misconceptions of world history and economic history respectively. And far from embarrassing Europeans, Hobson's book should inculcate them with pride in the knowledge that their ancestors were able to thrive and prosper in a multipolar world by learning and collaborating with a wide variety of different cultures. They set an example that their descendants would do well to follow.

Excellent challenge to eurocentric history
This is a GREAT and in some ways lifechanging book. Hobson shows that (to coin a phrase) everything (more or less) we know in the West is...well...wrong. To take some examples at random: the 'dark ages' weren't dark (they were the glory days of Western (Muslim) civilisation). Globalisation isn't new (it has its origins in trading networks dating back to 3500BC or even earlier, and a truly global world trading system was operational by 500 AD). Capitalism was not a Western invention (China was fully capitalist by the 11th/12 century AD). Neither was industrialisation or mass production. Most of the discoveries we take for granted as being 'Western' were either invented in the East, or were developed in the West from Eastern prototypes. Stupendously patronising nonsense in the West about how 'Islam' needs to go through a 'reformation' ignores the fact that Islamic thinkers in the 10th and 11th centuries were already discussing ideas that read like obvious precursors of Martin Luther. The fact is, that for all our 'reformations' and 'enlightenments' and 'renaissances', from the fall of the Roman Empire until about 1830-1840, Europe was an insignificant backwater, of no real interest to anybody in the civilised world: and by civilised i mean North Africa, China, the Middle East. It is only incredibly recently that Europe has raced ahead of the East, mainly as a result of our astonishing capacity for violence and aggression and our vicious racism. We then created a myth, the myth of Western superiority, with a wholesale rewriting of history that would have made George Orwell's head spin. The current rise of new economic superpowers like China, Japan and India are in no way a new phenomenon. On the contrary: this is merely a return to the mainstream of world history (after the aberrant 'blip' of Western hegemony). Countries like India and China are making up for the horrors inflicted upon them by Westerners who conquered and then pillaged their countries. Now that they have kicked the British out, these countries are now returning to the economic status they had before we invaded.
In short, a necessary corrective to Western triumphalism and a necessary context to current Western fun and games in Iraq.