Product Description

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #259484 in Books
• Published on: 1993-10-29
• Number of items: 1
• Binding: Paperback
• 246 pages

From Library Journal
Blaut (Univ. of Illinois) challenges the notion of "Eurocentric diffusionism": the pervasive presumption that superior Western culture has naturally flowed outward, bringing modernization to the rest of the world. In four chapters the author argues in detail that the historical propositions supporting European preeminence are myths. The conquest of the New World was simply the result of greater maritime accessibility to America, and the rise of Europe, after 1492, was due to the immense wealth of subsequent colonial accumulation. This is a highly analytical, provocative, and scholarly work. While not always convincing in certain aspects, it belongs in libraries serving readers interested in a revisionist view of world history.
- William F. Young, SUNY at Albany Lib.
Copyright 1993 Reed Business Information, Inc.

Review
"No scholarly book could possibly be totally new or original in this era, but Blaut's powerful and tightly focused opus comes close in the way he has marshalled and distilled a vast array of literature and evidence and the vigor and rigor with which he has pursued his central theses--propositions of unusual intellectual significance and timeliness. I find his argument quite persuasive and potentially mind-altering....This is a work with truly revolutionary implications, a badly needed recasting of our badly flawed, conventional First World vision of ourselves and the thrust of modern history. This could come to be regarded as a landmark achievement." --Wilber Zelinsky, Professor Emeritus, Penn State University

"This is a dogmatically written, occasionally outrageous, and absolutely spellbinding book. It is a strongly argued, alternative interpretation of the basic causes for the rise of the west to the hegemonic position it has occupied for perhaps five centuries....It is a major contribution to the debate now coming to the fore in the field. It makes its contribution through a merciless critique of mainline theories, by its selective synthesis of subaltern scholarship (both theory and piecemeal empirical evidence), and by its integration of whatever evidence exists to support this alternative position....I would plan to recommend it to my students as highlighting many of the controversies of the field and as representing an exagerrated version of one possible position." --Janet Abu-Lughod, Ph.D., The New School for Scholarly Research

"Will add excitement to courses in world history and self-critical Western Civilization and European history courses. I have adopted this provocative new book for my graduate colloquium on theories of world history and think that undergratuates too would enjoy Blaut's clarity of analysis and passionate writing. He depicts Eurocentric diffusionism as a pernicious ideology justifying European and United States colonial and neocolonial domination of the rest of the world. His largest chapter refults 'the myth of the European miracle,' the decisive superiority that Western Europe allegedly had achieved independent of outside help. Blaut, a historical geographer, has assembled a wealth of evidence for many parts of the world both for the long period before 1492 and for the transitional period of 1492 to 1688. As one who has taught European history since the early 1960's and world history since the late 1980's I enthusiastically welcome this exciting book which challenges and explains assumptions about European superiority. What puzzles me is that I have yet to see it reviewed. It deserves to be the focus of serious debate." --David M. Fahey, Miami University -Adopted for Theories of History (World)

"Jim Blaut has written an exciting book that successfully challenges conventional Eurocentric diffusionism. The text is very acessible and is well documented with numerous concrete historical examples. The book is very popular amongst the students that I teach." --Daniel Weiner, Associate Professsor of Geography, West Virginia University

"A concise examination of world historical development from a very refreshing viewpoint, and especially so, for courses that attempt to provide an account of world transformations from an anti-Eurocentric perspective. My students are enthralled by the accounts in the book of the participation of other regions of the world in the making of modern world history. The book is easy to read without the need for much prior knowledge, and the references for further examination are excellent." --Sing C. Chew, PhD, Humboldt State University

"...Attributing European supremecy, in part at any rate, to something resembling chance - Blaut throws down the gauntlet to those still coddling the model of an Inside/Outside world [his language] waiting to be 'modernized' and saved from itself." --B. Marie Perinbam, University of Maryland, College Park, Maryland

"Blaut could offer us sound leadership, in heeding Chaudhuri's (1990:43) sound admonition that 'the ceaseless quest of modern historiaans look-ing for the 'origins' and roots of capitalism is not much better than the alchemist's search for the philosopher's stone that transforms base metal into gold' -and still less to look for them uner a proverbial lamppost in European history, when most of the gold was, and still is, to be found elsewhere in the world." --Andre Gunder Frank, Faculty of Economics, University of Amsterdam, the Netherlands


"...a solid, well-documented and valuable study that will aid in combating Eurocentric prejudice and maligning of Third World countries and peoples." --Indianapolis Peace & Justice

"...an engaging book...a clear and accessible style, generally valid assertions, and an explicit sense of geography. The book serves as a valuable foil against a persistent Eurocentric bias in historical interpretation--effectively challenging how we look at the world." --The Professional Geographer

"This is a highly analytical, provocative, and scholarly work." --Library Journal

"....someone sounding off on a favorite topic can be fascinating, and Professor Blaut, an American, is certainly that. His attack is aimed, with much ammunition, at the theory that there is such a thing as an innate European superiority over the rest of the world and that civilization depends on it." --New Scientist

"....Thoroughly researched...Blaut presents arguments in a clear, highly readable, and engrossing fashion....Truly revolutionary....Blaut's greatest contribution is to call on readers to rethink the multitude of flawed Eurocentric assumptions upon which modern scholarly inquiry is based. The potential audience is far reaching and includes academics in the social sciences and humanities as well as informed readers interested in both historical and modern global economic development. The book is certainly appropriate for a graduate level course in non-Western development or the colonial experience." --Growth and Change

"A bold, lucid, and thought-provoking work." --Science & Society

Wilber Zelinsky, Professor Emeritus, Penn State University
This is a work with truly revolutionary implications, a badly needed recasting of our badly flawed, conventional First World vision of ourselves and the thrust of modern history. This could come to be regarded as a landmark achievement

Customer Reviews

Excellent read.
Working to dispel the myths of "the West's" (really European, and Euro-American) climb to being the dominant world power. Kinda a hard read but I like that sorta thing.

Diffuse Debunking of Diffusionism
Anyone familiar with academic professor-style writing will understand the structural weakness of this book. There are four very long chapters related to Blaut's theoretical argument, and they almost certainly originated as separate research projects written at different times for different audiences. Blaut has tied things together with occasional transitional paragraphs, surrounded by a shell of a general argument. Some knowledgeable reviewers here have found problems with Blaut's general history, and that's legitimate, but the fundamental problem with this book's construction makes such matters of detail a moot point.

Blaut's major contention is very strong, if not exactly groundbreaking. He wishes to debunk the body of historical theory called diffusionism – the dubious Eurocentric view that all the advancements of civilization, from agriculture to cities to capitalism, originated amongst genius Europeans and then were disseminated to ignorant peoples around the world. At the start of the book, Blaut promises to explore the intellectual processes that make mainstream and elite historians continue to believe such theories even after they have long since been disproved. That would have made this book a winner, but the promise never comes to fruition, leaving us instead with a tedious exercise in theorization.

After an exasperating opening chapter in which Blaut keeps telling us what he's going to cover later, this book collapses in the disastrous second chapter. Here he ceaselessly nitpicks the arguments of selected history books. This includes dozens of pages obsessing over the works of some historian named Eric L. Jones, which reeks of professional sour grapes. Unfortunately for Blaut, simply finding errors in other theories does not prove your own theory by default. Chapters 3 and 4 incomprehensibly descend into reductionist historical research on the development of feudalism outside of Europe and the influence of colonial riches on England's Glorious Revolution of 1688. Now what do these have to do with the attempted high-level theoretical insights of the rest of the book? Extremely little – although Blaut throws in occasional reminders that he's still leading up to great findings about his initial thesis. Well, he never does give us any real insights into why historians still believe in Eurocentric diffusionism. We only learn that Blaut really disagrees with it. Most would say he's correct given the realities of history, if only he could say it in a way that makes sense. [~doomsdayer520~]

Orientalism-lite: a weak and poorly grounded book...
It is difficult to critique Blaut's book without falling into the trap of expounding the `Eurocentric diffusion' theory oneself. If he was making the point that many historical thinkers at many points in time were guilty of over-estimating the uniqueness and impact of any `European miracle', then I would have some sympathy with his argument. However, his aims are much grander. He wishes to prove that the success of `Western' civilisation was a geographical happenstance, and that the whole canon of European historiography is built on the basis of `Eurocentric diffusion', and he, of course, is the only person to have spotted this.

Of course, Edward Said's Orientalism of 1979 had preceded Blaut's work by some 14 years, but despite the similarity of tone and approach, Blaut disregards Said's work in one sentence with a quick nod of approval - colonial activity in the Orient obviously being unimportant to his central thesis of the importance of the Americas in European growth. This is typical of Blaut's lack of interest in Asian, African or Middle-Eastern colonialism - for example, colonial India does not figure in his exposition at all. Blaut may not have been aware of the historical academic community's attacks on Said's thesis - these seem to me even more apparent in Blaut's thesis than in Said's. John MacKenzie's incisive critique of Said's Orientalism resonates with flaws I perceive in Blaut's book.

Firstly Blaut does not provide any evidence of linkage between `representation' of the `outside' world, as he calls it, in the `Colonizer's Model of the World' and the application of that `representation' in the colonialisation `project'. So what philosophical and historical texts existed in the critical 16th and 17th centuries that exhibited this Euro-chauvinism, and how were they harnessed by the colonisers in their supposed domination of the world? He only provides a brief survey of books from 1850 onwards in an extended footnote. Secondly, he creates a form of Euro-centrism himself in his argument painting a caricature of "the imperial mugger and unresisting victim" Thirdly, he essentialises `european intellectual history' as if it is one body of consistent opinion. An example of his writing shows this: "All scholarship is diffusionist insofar as it axiomatically accepts the Inside-Outside world". Also, he is highly selective about the examples he cites, and those that he cites as examples of `current thinking' are often archaic. An example can be seen in his argument against the `Malthusian Theory' of overcrowding "being propagated today", where he attacks books by Lawrence Stone and Robert Brenner, both published in 1977. He only admits in a footnote that an extensive exegesis criticising these works was penned in the 1980s. His selectivity also extends to his bold statement that all world regions were using the sea as effectively as each other prior to 1492. However, he cannot ignore the evidence of the prowess of the Portuguese in sailing techniques, but he hides this in another footnote. What of Bartolomeu Dias's rounding of the Cape of Good Hope which predated Columbus's voyage by four years? Surely the epic voyage of Da Gama's to Kenya and India in 1497/8 shows that Columbus's route was not a one-off freak happenstance?

John Thornton's book published the previous year gives a much more convincing historical and geographic explanation of European maritime Atlantic successes over the riverine African sailors, arguing that Europe (and the Middle-East) did have world-beating technical advantages in sailing technology and know-how by the mid 15th century.

The final `Saidian' streak in the book is its ahistoricism. Like Said, Blaut is not a historian. He is a geography professor. But how is this book ahistorical? Firstly, it ignores specific causality. What exactly was the flow of precious metals when they arrived back in Europe? Many historians believe that much of the bullion was respent on purchasing china, silk and tea. Surely this would have enriched Asia not Europe, and especially encouraged Asian industrialisation? Also, the countries which reaped the bullion rewards of South America (Spain and Portugal) patently did not defeudalise at the same rate as Britain and the Low Countries. And some areas, such as Italy and Germany did not gain directly from such colonies - and yet they lie within Blaut's uniform definition of `Europe'.

To conclude, Blaut fails to harness his idea of a `Coloniser's Model' to any practical instances of colonialist hegemony, or instances of underdevelopment in the colonies. William Coffey describes Blaut's approach as "spending a great deal of effort constructing a `straw man' which he heroically topples...but his approach may be more properly likened to an attack of (German) panzer divisions." He fails to convince that there is one unitary Europe with one Colonial Model of exploitation for capitalist development. Some analysis of the divisions within Europe is surely required to understand how capitalism developed, and where it found nourishment. The book argues against Weber's ideas of the `oriental despot', the cyclical rather than modernising nature of Asian societies and Weber's racist undertones. But it fails to address Weber's ideas on the famous `Protestant Work Ethic' and the Marx's and Weber's `spirit of the true man'. One year after the publication of Blaut's book. Francis Fukuyama published the highly successful and controversial End of History and the Last Man which investigated these issues - coming to very different conclusions from Blaut.

It is worth noting that Blaut's final book, entitled Eight Eurocentric historians was published in 2000, in the year of his death. It may be that this new edition may address some of the criticisms I level at his 1993 work.