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Society for History Education

The Dialectical Commons of Western Civilization and Global/World History Author(s): Nathan Douthit Source: The History Teacher, Vol. 24, No. 3 (May, 1991), pp. 293-305 Published by: Society for History Education Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/494618 Accessed: 28/10/2009 16:35 Your use of the JSTOR archive indicates your acceptance of JSTOR's Terms and Conditions of Use, available at http://www.jstor.org/page/info/about/policies/terms.jsp. JSTOR's Terms and Conditions of Use provides, in part, that unless you have obtained prior permission, you may not download an entire issue of a journal or multiple copies of articles, and you may use content in the JSTOR archive only for your personal, non-commercial use. Please contact the publisher regarding any further use of this work. Publisher contact information may be obtained at http://www.jstor.org/action/showPublisher?publisherCode=history. Each copy of any part of a JSTOR transmission must contain the same copyright notice that appears on the screen or printed page of such transmission. JSTOR is a not-for-profit service that helps scholars, researchers, and students discover, use, and build upon a wide range of content in a trusted digital archive. We use information technology and tools to increase productivity and facilitate new forms of scholarship. For more information about JSTOR, please contact [email protected].

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The Dialectical Commons of Wester Civilization and Global/WorldHistory

Nathan Douthit

"All alchemistictalk- the chthonicdescent of the Black Work,the electric charge of the White - is only a metaphor,a metaphorclear to the initiated for this age-old auscultation whose final result will be the Red; global knowledge, brilliant dominion over the planetary system of currents." Umberto Eco, Foucault's Pendulum(1988), p. 451.

GLOBAL CONSCIOUSNESS HAS BECOME ALL PERVASIVE in the last quarterof the 20th century.UmbertoEco's recentnovel with its ironically humoroustreatmentof the pursuitof occult global knowledge is only one among many documentaryexamples.1Although the debate between proponentsof westerncivilization or global/worldhistoryseems stalemated,2the trendtowarda more global perspectivein the historycurriculum of schools and colleges seems irreversible. I teach an introductoryhistory of western civilization course in a community college, but over the last year I have become increasingly interestedin exploring the disputedgroundbetween westerncivilization and global/world history. What at times seems to be a no-man's-land between the two histories, its arbitraryboundariesestablished by textbooks and tradition, can also be seen as a dialectical commons of questions, conflicting interpretations,and alternativetheories which can benefit historianson either side of the two histories debate. In this paper The History Teacher

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I will examine threequestionswhich representfor me a startin using the disputed theoretical ground between the two histories as a common resource. First: What are the origins of global consciousness in western civilization and what is global/world history? Second: Is global/world history uniquely western or do other civilizations deserve credit for its development?Third:Do currenttheories of global processes adequately take into considerationlocal/nationalprocesses of historicalchange? Origins of Global Consciousness and Global/WorldHistory Global consciousness, strictly speaking, should begin with the globe, what Umberto Eco's characterCasaubon,who together with his occult obsessed friendspursuedthe secret of the Templarsacross the centuries, refers to as "the one true Stone that fell in exile from heaven, the Great MotherEarth."3Although the Babyloniansfirst thoughtof the earthas a sphere and the Greek philosopherPtolemy in the second century A.D. produced the first world map, it was Martin Behaim, a Nuremberg geographer,who in 1492 constructedthe first globe displaying existing knowledge of the planet earth's geography on the eve of Columbus's discoveries.4Europeanexplorationsof the 16th centuryled to an explosion of globe and world map-making,the maps and globes of Gerard Mercatorbeing the best known.5The words "globe"and "global"entered the English language. "Global"historyandconsciousness,however,can be tracedbackto the first expressions of universalor world history. Herodotus'shistoryof the conflict between the Greek city states and the PersianEmpire,writtenin the fifth centuryB.C., includedinformationaboutEgyptandotherpeoples of Asia Minor. It might be consideredthe first "global"history that we know about. But the second centuryB.C. GreekhistorianPolybius, who wrote aboutthe rise of Rome to power in the period 264-146 B.C., came closer to ourmeaningof global historyin his statementof intent:"Now up to this time the world's history had been, so to speak, a series of disconnected transactions,as widely separatedin their origin and results as in theirlocalities. But fromthis time forthHistorybecomes a connected whole: the affairs of Italy and Libya are involved with those of Asia and Greece, and the tendencyof all is to unity."6LaterRomanhistoriansalso wrote in the traditionof universalhistory,7but afterTacitus the vision of universal humanitydied out in secular historical writing, as in political life.8 A sense of universalvision survived,but in philosophy andthe new religion of Christianity.Augustine's City of God, a theological interpretation of history, became the new model of universalhistory for the next thousandyears. Whathas been referredto as "theliberationof history from theology"

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began in 16th centuryItaly.9Secularuniversalhistory re-emergedin the 18th century as a result of two centuries of Europeanexploration and colonization. Voltaire in his Essay on the Manners and Customs of Nations (1757) wrotesympatheticallyaboutthe religious andphilosophical ideas of othercultures.10A few decadeslater,the Germanphilosophers Kant and Herderboth publishedessays on universalhistory." Hegel followed with his idea of universal history as the unfolding of a spiritual reality through the nation-state.'2Marx and Engels, in the mid-19th century,contributeda new global historicalperspective in The Communist Manifesto (1848), with their thesis that "the history of all hitherto existing society is the historyof class struggles."They also pointedto the global impact of the latest victor in the history of class struggles, the Europeanbourgeoisie, whose "needof a constantlyexpandingmarketfor its productschases the bourgeoisieover the whole surfaceof the globe."13 Recent theories of westernization,such as world system and dependency theory, which I will discuss later,have built on this basic insight of Marx and Engels about the global impact of capitalism. In the 20th century the idea of universal, world, or global history continued to attract interest, although the trend within the emerging historical profession was to write monographs or general histories on nation-state development. Disillusioned by the destructive forces of westerncivilization in the FirstWorldWar,OswaldSpenglerpopularized the idea of studyingworld culturesfrom a relativisticpoint of view in The Decline of the West (1918, 1923).14The Second World War produced another wave of disillusionment reflected in the writings of Geoffrey Barracloughin the late 1940s and early 1950s.15He expressed doubts about the existence of a common Europeantraditionand warned that emphasis on a classical tradition obscured outside influences on the development of wester Europeanhistory. In "the new constellation of world-affairs," Barraclough saw a need for more recognition of the influence of non-western history on the West. True to his misgivings, Barracloughhas been a leader amonghistoriansin the effort to develop a more global frameworkfor the understandingof western civilization in the post-WorldWar II period.'6 This brief survey of universal, world, or global historical thought in western civilization suggests that global consciousness has origins in the classical traditionof western thought, which some scholars have contrasted with what they regard as the ahistorical universalism of nonwestern Buddhist and Confucian civilizations."7As a practical matter, however, contemporaryglobal consciousnesscanprobablybe datedto the crossing of a more recentthresholdof awarenessin the 1960s. In 1962 the historianHans Kohn, who hadjust turnedseventy years of age, wrote in

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the preface to his book TheAge of Nationalism: TheFirst Era of Global History, that "in the middle of the twentiethcenturymankindhas entered the firststage of globalhistory."18 The historianL. S. Stavrianosandothers also published their textbook A Global History of Man that same year.19 In 1968 MarshallMcLuhanand QuentinFiore's book War and Peace in the Global Village popularizedthe global village metaphor.20This book documented the growing intellectual consciousness of global interconnections stemming from a combinationof political, economic, and electronic communicationdevelopments.By 1970 a concern with the global environment intensified to the point that United Nations SecretaryGeneral U Thant issued a "global alert,"warning that "ours is the first global civilization which can wrecknot just one nationor society, but the very earthitself."21Throughthe 1970s and 1980s this new sense of global awareness originating in communications and environmental studies broadenedto influence thinkingin all of the humanities,social sciences, and sciences.22 Despite the rise of global consciousness, historianshave been cautious in theiruse of the word"global."Among the proponentsof global history there has been a reluctanceto apply the word "global"to the whole of human history. Kohn and Barracloughreserved the word for special application to the recent era, either the 19th or 20th century. Even Stavrianosandhis collaborators,despitetheiruse of "globalhistory"in the title of theirtextbook,statedthat"globalhistorybeganin 1500."Thatdate "ended the age-old separation between Eurasia and the other continents.'23 There seem to be two currentdefinitions of global history. One treats global history as synonymous with world history, a history that encompasses all the majorcivilizations and their interactions.Let's call this the general definition of global history. However, if one refers to "theera of global history," then one means the recent period of intensified global interconnectionswhich has followed westernexpansionsince 1500. Let's call this the special definitionof global history. The TimesAtlas of World History uses the word "global" in a way consistent with the special definition when it calls the period from 1870 to the present"The Age of Global Civilisation."24 If one thinks of global consciousness as an historicalinterestin other cultures or as philosophical and religious ideas which embrace other peoples regardlessof their race or culture,then the classical traditionof western thought has incorporatedglobal consciousness to some degree since the fifth centuryB.C. But if global consciousness is somethingquite distinct from universalizing principles and perspectives in history, philosophy, and religion, if it is a state of mind peculiarto the age in which

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Europeansbegan to explore and colonize other continents,then it has to be treatedas discontinuouswith the classical traditionof westem thought. As history teachers we can choose either one or the other of these two definitions of global history. But perhapswe should look upon them as opposing cases in a debatethathas yet to be concluded.In my opinion,the more we explore the boundariesbetweencivilizations andcontactsacross those boundaries,the more we are likely to discover the importantrole played by interactionsbetween civilizations which the generaldefinition of global historyhighlights,in short,the morewe arelikely to discoverthe beginnings of global consciousness before 1500 in various civilizations. Contributionsof Non-WesternCivilizations to Global/WorldHistory The second question is related to the first. Is global/world history uniquely western or do other civilizations deserve credit for its development?The classical traditionof westen civilization identifies a streamof universalisticideas that point to the eventual unifying embraceof European colonization, industrialization,and imperialism.Similarly,the special definition of global history gives credit to westerization for the globalization of recent human history. The general definition of global history emphasizes the contributions of all civilizations, but it also incorporatesthe special definition when it comes to the modem era. Let me draw upon one of the leading global/world history college textbooks, A History of the Human Community(3rd edition, 1990) to illustrate the general definition of global history. William H. McNeill stresses the importanceof tradeand conquest in the global expansion of empires. However, he shows that the spreadof new religious ideas was associatedwith the expansionof the Chineseand Indianas well as GrecoRoman and Roman-Christianempires in the period 200 B.C.-600 A.D. Writing about the impact of Buddhismon Japan,for example, McNeill states that "conversionto Buddhism was a very importantstep toward civilization."25Throughoutthis period the major centers of civilization experienced cycles of "advance, retreat,and partial recovery."26When Islam burst onto the global historical stage in the seventh century, it expanded quickly over the next several centuries from North Africa to India. McNeill notes that "in many ways it was unique, built around religion and the fresh revelationof God's will."27 On the whole it is difficult to single out uniquecontributionsof major civilizations and empires to the developmentof global consciousness in McNeill's survey text. Global consciousness seems to arise in a general way throughtradeandthe spreadof culturalideas. In discussing the basis of European expansion after 1450, McNeill stresses three factors: a flexible economy; a warlike spirit; and the "techniques"of printing,

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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 15001850 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 adequately take into considerationlocalnational adaptationsto westernization? 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

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prominently.32But no one has exerted a more forceful theoreticalinfluence on global historical study than ImmanualWallerstein,a sociologist of social change, whose "world-systemtheory"has providedthe leading paradigm for historians writing about the relationshipof Third World countriesto the West in the modem era.33Accordingto Wallersteinthere emerged in Europeduringthe period 1450-1620 a "world-system"based on capitalistprinciples.This system spreadits influence over the rest of the world during the course of the next four centuries, establishing relations of domination by the European"core" nation-states over the "periphery"of non-Westem societies. Wallerstein'sworld-systemtheory drawsupon the FrenchhistorianFemand Braudel'swritings aboutworld economy andon "dependency"theorywhich explains the underdevelopment of the Third World in terms of capitalisteconomic hegemony. Wallerstein's world-system theory has been sharply criticized, especially for its empirical weaknesses.34Wallerstein's more severe critics reject the idea that an integratedcapitalistworld-systememerged before the 19th century. The major thrustof their argumentsare that Wallerstein's methodological insistence on the study of a world-systemdirects attentionaway fromlocal conditions(e.g. domesticproductionratherthan internationaltrade) that contradict his global thesis.35 In addition to Marxist critics who strongly reject Wallerstein's redefinition of class relationsand de-emphasisof class conflict in the developmentof capitalism andEuropeanworldhegemony,historiansandanthropologistsstudying the ThirdWorldalso have difficultywith global developmenttheories. The critique of world system and dependency theory from a Third World perspective can be illustrated by William B. Taylor's article, "Between Global Process and Local Knowledge: An Inquiryinto Early Latin American Social History, 1500-1900."36Taylor raises five major criticismsof dependencytheory(andby extensionof Wallerstein'sworldsystem theory): 1) Viewing "capitalismas a single system of meaning," dependencystudiespay too "littleattentionto the differentialeffects of the capitalisms [mercantileand industrial]on social relationshipsin various places and times"; 2) Economic determinism ignores "pre-Conquest social forms and relationshipsof productionin different localities"; 3) Emphasis on "capitalistrelationshipsof exchange" de-emphasizes the role of the state in Latin America; 4) Economic change is viewed as imposed from the outside therebyneglecting "the role of local modes of thought and practiceand local arrangementsof power [i.e. local elites]"; and5) By emphasizing"thesweeping influenceof capitalismdependency studies overlook regional variations"(e.g. Argentinaand Mexico "in the first half-century after Independence, [which] do not seem to fit the dependencymodels").37Carol A. Smith reinforcesTaylor's critiquein a

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discussion of Western Guatemala.38Smith evaluates world-system approaches to the history of Guatemala against ethnographicdata. She concludes that "to understandany particularlocal system, such as thatin Guatemala,one must look at the interactionof global and local forces" instead of global capitalismalone.39 The terms "local" and "global"representpolaritiesin terms of which we can think abouthistorical change. In discussing "paradigmsof international relations,"for example, Erie Keenes writes about the need to link thinking about internationalrelationsto local politics - "theprocess by which groups of people decide for themselves what the good life is in their particularcomer of the world, and how to get it."40Politics, a sense of history, as well as the writingof novels, poems, and plays begin at the local level. Clifford Geertz in his collection of essays entitled Local Knowledge emphasizes the foundationalnatureof the "local" when he says "the shapes of knowledge are always ineluctably local."41In their differentways andseparatefields of research,Taylor,Smith, Keenes, and Geertz are warning against neglect of local influences on global/world history. Despite its critics,however, Wallerstein'sworld-systemtheorycontinues to influence historianslooking for a more global perspective.42That influence has recently shown up in writing about the history of the AmericanWest. In the November, 1989, issue of the WesternHistorical Quarterly,threearticlesconvergeon the global dimensionsof the American West. WalterNugent discusses the interrelatednessof global frontier and imperialimpulses in the period 1870-1914, and a common featureof frontiersand empires- exploitationof indigenous peoples.43Michael P. Malone urges historians of the American West to cease relying upon Frederick Jackson Turner's frontier thesis as a unifying interpretive framework and to seek a new model for identifying the West as a distinctiveregion.44Malone creditsthe historiansWilliam H. McNeill, L. S. Stavrianos, and Theodore Von Laue, as well as Wallerstein, with providing a useful global view of Western capitalist expansion and its harmfuleffects, andhe suggests thatthe word"frontier"be replacedwith the term"globalization- the ongoing integrationof thislong-remoteplace into the human community."45In a third article, William G. Robbins argues that historians of the American West have neglected "politics, power, class relations,and otherexpressionsof capitalism"which would link the historyof the AmericanWest with westerncivilization history.46 Robbins, too, draws upon the global perspectives of FernandBraudel, Wallerstein,KarlMarx,anddependencytheoristsfor an understandingof the "evolvingdialecticbetweenchangesin worldcapitalismandlocal economics."47

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These examples of theoreticalapproachesto researchon the historiesof CentralAmericaandthe AmericanWest illustratedivergentemphaseson global and local processes. CentralAmericanscholars suggest that local processes are being neglected, while historians of the American West arguethatglobal processes arebeing neglected.This leads me to conclude thatwheretherehas been neglect of global connections,global theoretical perspectives may be useful. But they may also distort our view of historical processes if not tested by "micro-studies"of the dynamics of local cultures. HansKohn in TheAge of Nationalism:TheFirst Era of Global History highlighted the fact that the era of global history began in national competition. He envisioned that the "age of pan-nationalism"would In ourteachingof contemporary merge into "theage of pan-humanism."48 history, there is a dangerthat we may be swept along by enthusiasmfor global integrationand cooperation. While some internationalrelations specialistshave embracedthe concept of a global political environment,49 others are not persuadedthat the world is ready for a paradigmshift in internationalrelationstheoryor worldpolitics. The nation-statecontinues to exert a strong force in global politics. No "global community"has emergedto replacethe nation-state.As Yale H. FergusonandRichardW. Mansbach observe, "the intensification of local and sublocal 'nationalism' produces resistance to rising interdependence,repeatedly forcing local elites to act contraryto the logic of 'national' or 'global' interests producedby that interdependence."50 The same point is made by A. D. Smith, who writes that "manystates today are linked in a series of nearglobal transactionsanddependencies,"but the internationalsystem actually encourages nationalism. As a result, "nationalism's diffusion has simply globalised the traditionalEuropean'balance of power' concepts and relationships,and these in turnare now reinforcingnationalisms.""5 Recent events in EasternEuropeand the Soviet Union also speak to the revival of local ethnic and national aspirations.52 As a teacher of history I believe we should be wary of abandoning concepts framed in a context of national rivalries and national history. Global history has to take note of trendstowardinternationalcommunity and conflict resolution,but it must also pay attentionto the conservative force of nationalismandotherforms of local culturalinfluence on human history. Significantly, all recentdiscussions of the futureof Europeboth east andwest focus on regionalintegration.It is this fact thathas led Silviu Brucanto suggest thatwe live in a transitionalperiodof time.53In the short term- how long one can only guess - the evolution towardgreaterworld integrationwill pass througha stage of regionalintegration.If this is the continuing reality of our time, as it has been for the past forty years of

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militaryalliances (since the creationof NATO in 1949), then the teaching of contemporaryglobal historymust incorporatean evolutionaryperspective which leaves room for the older paradigmof political realism and balanceof powerpolitics as the worldmoves towarda newerparadigmof universally recognized global political principles and institutions. Conclusion If the theoretical disagreements between western civilization and global/world history are truly a dialectical commons, ratherthan a noman's land, as I have suggested, then a readeroughtto leave this dialogue with a new sense of direction for teaching. Let me indicate what its teaching implications are for me. First, I want to work towardbreakingdown the separationof the two histories. As McNeill's writing aboutthe interactionsof civilizations on theirboundariesshows, boundarylines are artificial.They exist at police checkpoints and dissolve in the hills beyond. One importantimplication for my teaching is that the influence of the wester on the non-western world is a propositionto be debatedand not to be accepted a priori. Second, I want to continue to question the distinction between the general and special definitions of global/world history. The distinction highlights for me the fact that interactionsbetween civilizations vary in scope and intensity in differenttime periods. But the essential duality of "global"history (i.e. pre- and post-1500 periods), which the general and special definitions express, makes me want to look for evidence of interaction,mutual influence, diffusion of culturalelements, and other "global"effects throughouthuman history. Third,the generaland special definitionsof global historytend toward simplification:one as the idea of the globalizationof the West, the other as the idea of the westemization of the globe. I look to the analytical concept of global/local processes as a way to avoid these simplifications. I believe that we will find local and more global processes at work throughoutmost of humanhistory,if we look for them. I find the concept of global/local processes to be an especially useful check on the impulse to westemize the recent"eraof global history."

Notes 1. Umberto Eco, Foucault's Pendulum (San Diego and London:HarcourtBrace Jovanovich, 1988).

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2. See, for example, GilbertAllardyce,"The Rise and Fall of the Wester Civilization 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). Hans Meyerhoff, ed. The Philosophy of History in Our Time: An Anthology 9 (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. 5873. 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

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Delhi: Sage Publications,1982); David E. Vocke, "ThoseVaryingPerspectiveson Global Education,"TheSocial Studies (January/February 1988), 18-20; 'The Age of GlobalCivilisation,"pp. 254-295, The TimesAtlas of WorldHistory;CraigLambert,"GlobalSpin," HarvardMagazine (January/February 1990), 17-30 on global thinkingat HarvardUniversity. 23. Stavrianos,et al. A Global History of Man, p. 48. 24. The TimesAtlas of WorldHistory, pp. 254-295. 25. William H. McNeill, A History of the Human Community3rd ed. (Englewood Cliffs, NJ: PrenticeHall, 1990), p. 195. 26. Ibid., p. 214. 27. Ibid., p. 217. 28. Ibid., p. 334. 29. JohannaM. Meskill, JohnMeskill, and Ainslie T. Embree,TheNon-European World1500/1850 (Glenview and London:Scott, Foresman,1971), p. 139. 30. Kohn, The Age of Nationalism, p. 31. 31. Hichem Djait, Europe and Islam: Cultures and Modernity (Berkeley and London:University of CaliforniaPress, 1985), p. 109. 32. Percy and Suarez, "Today's Westernand World Civilization College Texts." 33. ImmanuelWallerstein,The ModernWorld-System:CapitalistAgricultureand the Origins of the European World-Economyin the Sixteenth Century (New York: Academic Press, 1974) andTheModernWorld-SystemII. Merchantilismand the Consolidation of the EuropeanWorld-Economy,1600-1750 (New York:Academic Press, 1980). 34. See Robert S. DuPlessis, "Wallerstein,World Systems Analysis, and Early Moder EuropeanHistory,"The History Teacher, 21 (February1988), 221-232. 35. See GerryKeams, "History,Geographyand World-SystemsTheory,"Journal of Historical Geography, 14:3 (1988), 281-292. 36. In OlivierZunz,ed. RelivingthePast: The WorldsofSocialHistory (ChapelHill andLondon:The Universityof NorthCarolinaPress, 1985), pp. 115-181. On dependency theorysee also ChrisBrown, "DevelopmentandDependency,"pp. 62-68, in MargotLight andA. J. R. Groom,eds.InternationalRelations:AHandbookofCurrentTheory(Boulder, CO: Lynne RiennerPublications,1985). 37. Ibid., pp. 125-127. 38. Carol A. Smith, "Local History in Global Context: Social and Economic Transitionsin WesternGuatemala,"ComparativeStudiesin SocietyandHistory,26 (April 1984), 193-228. 39. Ibid., p. 224. 40. ErieKeenes, "Paradigmsof InternationalRelations:BringingPoliticsBackIn," InternationalJournal, 44 (Winter 1988-89), 41-67. 41. CliffordGeertz,Local Knowledge:FurtherEssays inInterpretiveAnthropology (New York:Basic Books, 1983), p. 4. 42. See, forexample, PeterJ. Taylor,Political Geography:WorldEconomy,NationState andLocality (New York:Longman,1985);BerniceCohen,GlobalPerspectives:The Total CultureSystem in the Modern World(London:Codek Publications,1988); George Modelski, Long Cycles in WorldPolitics (Seattle andLondon:Universityof Washington Press, 1987). 43. WalterNugent, "Frontiersand Empiresin the LateNineteenthCentury,"Western Historical Quarterly,20 (November 1989), 393-408. 44. Michael P. Malone, "Beyond the Last Frontier:Toward A New Approachto WesternAmerican History,"ibid., pp. 409-427. 45. Ibid., p. 424.

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46. William G. Robbins,"WesternHistory:A Dialectic on the Moder Condition," ibid., pp. 429-449. 47. Robbins,ibid., p. 442. A global perspectiveon the historyof the AmericanWest can also be found in DonaldWorster,Riversof Empire:Water,Aridity,and the Growthof the AmericanWest (New York:Pantheon,1985), in which Worsterapplies the hydraulic society concept of Karl Wittfogel, Oriental Despotism: A ComparativeStudy of Total Power (New Haven and London:Yale University Press, 1957). 48. Kohn, The Age ofNationalism, p. 166. 49. For a survey of internationalrelations textbooks, see Dennis J. D. Sandole, "Textbooks," pp. 214-228, in Margot Light and A. J. R. Groom, eds. International Relations: A Handbookof CurrentTheory. 50. Yale H. Ferguson and RichardW. Mansbach,The Elusive Quest: Theory and InternationalPolitics (Columbia:Universityof SouthCarolinaPress, 1988), pp. 105-107. 51. A. D. Smith,"Internationalism," pp. 66-77, in MarcWilliams, ed. International Relations in the TwentiethCentury:A Reader (New York: New York University Press, 1989). 52. Zbigniew Bzezinski, "Post-CommunistNationalism," Foreign Affairs, 68 (Winter 1989/90), 1-25. 53. Silviu Brucan,"The Global Crisis."

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