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The Dialectical Commons of Wester Civilization and
Global/WorldHistory
Nathan Douthit
shipbuilding/navigation,and gunpower/militaryorganization.28
Fromthe perspectiveof the generaldefinitionof global history, as it is
representedby McNeill's text, global historyderivesmore or less equally
from different civilization centers. Prior to the 18th and 19th centuries
thereis little to distinguishthe world's civilizationsin termsof theirglobal
unifying influence. A historyof the non-westernworldin the period 1500-
1850 reinforcesthis point by statingthat "nowherein Africa or Asia did
Europeanpower reach more than a few miles inlanduntil the eighteenth
century."29Hans Kohn stresses that what emerged in Europe in the 17th
and 18th centuries was "a new and revolutionarycivilization."30But
paradoxicallyit may have been anothercivilizationthatprovidedthe push
into this new historical dimension. The Islamic scholar Hichem Djait
emphasizes Islam's influence on Europe:"Islam was at once a military
force threateningEuropeand an economic sphere sharingits dynamism,
just as later it would be an ideological enemy and a philosophicalmodel.
In a word,Europe'semergenceintohistorytook place- andcouldnot have
taken place otherwise- throughthe mediationof Islam:in the beginning
by means of a defensive recoil, afterwardby an offensive explosion."31
The answerto the second questionthereforedependsuponwhetherone
works within the general or special definition of global history. Global/
world historiansemphasizethe contributionsof non-westernandwestern
civilizations to the development of global consciousness prior to about
1500. After 1500 they highlight the West's role in shaping a new era of
global history. However, if Djait's thesis is correct,the West took on this
role in response initially to the challenge of Islam.
Global Versus Local Influences in History
If we approachthe eraof globalhistorysince 1500 fromthe perspective
of non-western civilizations, then the process of local adaptationsto
westernization becomes a key focus of study. This leads to the third
question: Do currenttheories of global/world historical processes ade-
quately take into considerationlocalnational adaptationsto westerniza-
tion? Here again it seems to me thatthe generaland special definitionsof
global historylead in differentdirections.The special definitionof global
history has emphasized,as Marx and Engels did, the hegemonic force of
capitalism as it spread around the world. But do we run the risk of
overlooking the influence of local factors by imposing world system or
dependencytheory on local, regional, or nationalhistory?
In the writing of history textbooks there are a handful of leading
historianswho over the last threedecades have pushed historical studies
in the global direction- T. WalterWallbank,AlastaireM. Taylor,Edward
McNall Bums, William H. McNeill, and L. S. Stavrianos figure most
The Dialectical Commons of WesternCivilization and Global/WorldHistory 299
Notes
1. Umberto Eco, Foucault's Pendulum (San Diego and London:HarcourtBrace
Jovanovich, 1988).
The Dialectical Commons of WesternCivilization and Global/WorldHistory 303
2. See, for example, GilbertAllardyce,"The Rise and Fall of the Wester Civili-
zation Course,"AmericanHistorical Review,87 (June 1982), 695-743; William A. Percy
andPedroJ. Suarez,"Today'sWesternandWorldCivilizationCollege Texts: A Review,"
The History Teacher, 17 (August 1984), 567-590; Carolyn J. Mooney, "Sweeping
CurricularChange Is Under Way at Stanford as University Phases Out Its 'Western
Culture'Program,"Chronicle of Higher Education,35 (December 15, 1988), 11-13.
3. Eco, Foucault's Pendulum,p. 451.
4. R. V. Tooley, Maps and Map-Makers(New York:Dorset Press, 1987 [1949]),
pp. 3-7, 24-25.
5. Ibid., pp. 31-32.
6. Walter Emil Kaegi, Jr., and Peter White, eds. Rome: Late Republic and
Principate, Vol. 2, Universityof Chicago Readingsin WesternCivilization (Chicago and
London:University of Chicago Press, 1986), p. 11.
7. M. I. Finley, The Ancient Greeks: An Introductionto their Life and Thought
(New York: Viking Press, 1964), p. 94.
8. AndrewLintott,"RomanHistorians,"pp.226-242, inJohnBoardman,etal., eds.
The RomanWorld(Oxford and New York: Oxford University Press, 1988).
9 Hans Meyerhoff, ed. The Philosophy of History in Our Time: An Anthology
(GardenCity, NY: Doubleday Anchor, 1959), p. 4.
10. PeterGay, TheEnlightenment:An Interpretation/TheScience of Freedom(New
York and London:W. W. Norton, 1977 [1969]), p. 392.
11. Ronald H. Nash, ed. Ideas of History (New York: E. P. Dutton, 1969), p. 68.
12. PatrickGardner,ed.TheoriesofHistory(Glencoe:The FreePress, 1959), pp. 58-
73.
13. Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels, The CommunistManifesto, trans. Samuel
Moore (New York: Socialist LaborParty, 1888), pp. 7-21, 28, in Edgar E. Knoebel, ed.
Classics of WesternThought:TheModernWorld,Vol. 3, 4th ed. (San Diego andToronto:
HarcourtBrace Jovanovich, 1988), p. 372.
14. Oswald Spengler,TheDecline of the West,2 vols. (New York:AlfredA. Knopf,
1926, 1928.
15. Geoffrey Barraclough,History inA ChangingWorld(Oxford:Basil Blackwell,
1957).
16. See, for example,Geoffrey Barraclough,Introductionto ContemporaryHistory
(Middlesex: PenguinBooks, 1967) andThe TimesAtlas of WorldHistory,editor in 1978,
Geoffrey Barraclough,3rd ed. edited by Norman Stone (Maplewood, NJ: Hammond,
1989).
17. See, for example, Eric Voegelin's worksThe Worldof the Polis (Baton Rouge:
LouisianaState University Press, 1957) andThe EcumenicAge (Baton Rouge: Louisiana
State University Press, 1974).
18. HansKohn,TheAgeofNationalism:TheFirst Era ofGlobal History(New York
and Evanston:HarperTorchbooks, 1968), p. x.
19. Leften S. Stavrianos,et al. A Global Historyof Man (Boston andSan Francisco:
Allyn and Bacon, 1962). This was a geographicalhistory. The authorsused the word
"global"in the title, but switched to "world"in the text.
20. Marshall McLuhan and Quentin Fiore, War and Peace in the Global Village
(New York: Bantam, 1968).
21. HenryJ. Kellerman,"Ecology:AWorld Concern,"pp. 17-39, inThe GreatIdeas
Today, 1971 (Chicago: EncyclopediaBritannica,1971).
22. See Silviu Brucan, "The Global Crisis," InternationalStudies Quarterly, 18
(March1984), 97-109; GaryK. Bertsch,ed. GlobalPolicy Studies (Beverly Hills andNew
304 NathanDouthit