The origins of the modern world 4th edition pdf

The Origins of the Modern World: Fate and Fortune in the Rise of the West






How did the modern world get to be the way it is? How did we come to live in a globalized, industrialized, capitalistic set of nation-states? Moving beyond Eurocentric explanations and histories that revolve around the "rise of the West," distinguished historian Robert B. Marks explores the roles of Asia, Africa, and the New World in the global story. He defines the modern world as marked by industry, the nation state, interstate warfare, a large and growing gap between the wealthiest and poorest parts of the world, and an escape from environmental constraints. Bringing the saga to the present, Marks considers how and why the United States emerged as a world power in the 20th century and the sole superpower by the 21st century; the powerful resurgence of Asia; and the vastly changed relationship of humans to the environment.



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The Origins of the Modern World: A Global and Ecological Narrative from the Fifteenth to the Twenty-first Century






This clearly written and engrossing book presents a global narrative of the origins of the modern world from 1400 to the present. Unlike most studies, which assume that the "rise of the West" is the story of the coming of the modern world, this history, drawing upon new scholarship on Asia, Africa, and the New World, constructs a story in which those parts of the world play major roles.

Robert B. Marks defines the modern world as one marked by industry, the nation state, interstate warfare, a large and growing gap between the wealthiest and poorest parts of the world, and an escape from "the biological old regime." He explains its origins by emphasizing contingencies (such as the conquest of the New World); the broad comparability of the most advanced regions in China, India, and Europe; the reasons why England was able to escape from common ecological constraints facing all of those regions by the 18th century; and a conjuncture of human and natural forces that solidified a gap between the industrialized and non-industrialized parts of the world.

Now in a ne

The Origins of the Modern World: A Global and Ecological Narrative from the Fifteenth to the Twenty-first Century




First published in 2002,
The Origins of the Modern World: A Global and Environmental Narrative from the Fifteenth to the Twenty-First Century
by Robert B. Marks is a world history that asks how the globalized and industrialized modern world came to be. Challenging the notion that the rise of the British Empire and then the US was inevitable, Marks addresses questions like how the West came to dominate the world until relatively recently and how civilization let itself get to the point that it faces the existential threat of climate change? A specialist in environmental and Chinese history, Marks taught history at Whittier College in California until his retirement in 2019.

Several editions of
The Origins of the Modern World
have been published. This guide refers to the 2024 edition of the book.


Summary



The Origins of the Modern World
begins in the year 1400, when all of humanity lived under what Robert B. Marks describes as the “old biological regime” (19). This refers to the fact that only so much land was available, and agriculture could produce only

The Origins of the Modern World: A Global and Ecological Narrative from the Fifteenth to the Twenty-first Century




Marks considers the environmental and economic state of the world by the year 1400. Today, the human population exceeds eight billion, but in 1400 it was only 380 million. Almost all people lived in rural areas, and human settlements covered 7% of the land on Earth. Although the world has many more people today, 70% of them live on the same 7% of land or 4.25 million square miles as their ancestors in 1400. In addition, Marks identifies 15 advanced civilizations. These civilizations were the ultimate product of an “agricultural revolution” that began in modern-day Iraq when people transitioned from hunting-and-gathering to permanent agricultural settlements. The settlements gave rise to social hierarchies, in which most of the population made food through agriculture and an elite of priests and rulers needed to explain and protect society. The settlements also gave rise to artisans, who made and maintained the items necessary for society and culture, and to trade between cities and tribes.

Even by 1400, the world’s largest urban populations amounted to only 1% of