World history suffers from a paucity of clearly articulated,
convincing explanations. While the rise of postmodernism and
challenges to Eurocentrism did lead to some important correctives, the
pendulum has swung too far the other direction, with a corresponding
danger of ‘throwing the baby out with the bathwater’. We need
careful, theoretically informed debates about ways of organizing world
history. What constitutes a good historical explanation? What should
guide historians to choose relevant facts? Which theoretical schools
could be made useful, and to what ends? These questions are especially
relevant to the main topic of this book: the ‘great divergence’
between the west and the rest of the world, and how this historical
rupture is to be explained. The book provides extensive critical
analyses of some of the key claims in world history, analyzing their
strengths as well as their major weaknesses—too often rooted in
insufficient familiarity of historians with theories they discard. It
also historicizes the field and the debates to partly account for what
caused some theories to become more influential and others to fall
into oblivion—despite the fact that the more influential frameworks
are seriously flawed and some of the more marginalized ideas are more
coherent and plausible. The book offers insights regarding the
theoretical and political relevance of older debates about the
transition to capitalism and historical materialism. Three major
schools of thought in world history are critically examined through an
in-depth theoretical and comparative analysis that has not been
undertaken elsewhere: the so-called ‘California School’, World
Systems Analysis, and Marxist theories of history, capitalism, and the
transition from feudalism to capitalism. Murphy argues that, despite
some of the more recent criticisms of older approaches to world
history, the older theories remain indispensable for the writing of
world history and for coming to terms with issues of global poverty,
inequality and eco-catastrophe.
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Produktdetaljer
ISBN
9783111247335
Publisert
2023
Utgave
1. utgave
Utgiver
Vendor
De Gruyter Oldenbourg
Språk
Product language
Engelsk
Format
Product format
Digital bok
Forfatter