The Measure of Civilization

Resumen del libro

In the last thirty years, there have been fierce debates over how civilizations develop and why the West became so powerful. The Measure of Civilization presents a brand-new way of investigating these questions and provides new tools for assessing the long-term growth of societies. Using a groundbreaking numerical index of social development that compares societies in different times and places, award-winning author Ian Morris sets forth a sweeping examination of Eastern and Western development across 15,000 years since the end of the last ice age. He offers surprising conclusions about when and why the West came to dominate the world and fresh perspectives for thinking about the twenty-first century.

Adapting the United Nations' approach for measuring human development, Morris's index breaks social development into four traits--energy capture per capita, organization, information technology, and war-making capacity--and he uses archaeological, historical, and current government data to quantify patterns. Morris reveals that for 90 percent of the time since the last ice age, the world's most advanced region has been at the western end of Eurasia, but contrary to what many historians once believed, there were roughly 1,200 years--from about 550 to 1750 CE--when an East Asian region was more advanced. Only in the late eighteenth century CE, when northwest Europeans tapped into the energy trapped in fossil fuels, did the West leap ahead.

Resolving some of the biggest debates in global history, The Measure of Civilization puts forth innovative tools for determining past, present, and future economic and social trends.

Biografía del autor

Ian Morris es doctor en Historia por la Universidad de Cambridge y ocupa la cátedra Jean y Rebecca Willard de Cultura e Historia Clásica en la Universidad de Standford. Es miembro fundador del Centro de Arqueología de Stanford y ha sido su director durante dos mandatos. Entre 2000 y 2007 dirigió las excavaciones de la Universidad de Stanford en Monte Polizzo, Sicilia. Ha publicado trece libros y más de ochenta artículos sobre Arqueología e Historia. Su obra ¿Por qué manda Occidentex{0026} x02026; por ahora? (Ático de los Libros, 2014), ganó el premio Pen de No Ficción y se convirtió en un fenómeno de ventas mundial. También es el autor de Guerra, ¿para qué sirve? (Ático de los Libros, 2017). Ian Morris ha sido galardonado con premios de la Fundación Guggenheim, la Fundación Mellon, la National Geographic Society y el National Endowment for the Humanities. Vive en las montañas de Santa Cruz, en California.