Escape from Rome: The Failure of Empire and the Road to ProsperityPrinceton University Press, 2019/10/15 - 670 ページ "In this book, Walter Scheidel provides a unique take on the perennial debates about the rise of the west. His main argument is straightforward and provocative: the fact that nothing like the Roman Empire ever again emerged in Europe was a crucial precondition for modern economic growth, the Industrial Revolution and worldwide conquest much later on. Contra Ken Pomeranz's classic thesis about the "Great Divergence" of the 18th/19th centuries when northwestern Europe pulled away from China and the rest of world in terms of economic performance and overall power, Scheidel argues there was a much more significant "first great divergence" in late antiquity which set the stage. Scheidel argues that it wasn't until the West "escaped" from the dominance of the Roman empire did it flourish economically (unlike China, comparison which will be explored in this book, which despite transformations and setbacks remained a "universal empire" for much of it's 2,200 year history). Scheidel approaches this "first great divergence" via a new take on some central question concerning the life and fate of the Roman Empire: How did the Roman Empire come into existence - did its rise depend on unique conditions that were never repeated later on? Was its fall inevitable? Why was nothing like the Roman Empire ever rebuilt? And did this matter for (much) later developments? He concludes by arguing that the fall and lasting disappearance of the Roman Empire was an indispensable precondition for later European exceptionalism and therefore for the creation of the modern world we now live in. From this perspective, the absence of the Roman Empire had a much greater impact than its previous existence and its subsequent influence on European culture, which is of course well documented in many domains and often accorded great significance. Scheidel does concede that a monopolistic empire like Rome's which first created a degree of shared culture and institutions but subsequently went away for good was perhaps more favorable to later European development than a scenario in which no such empire had ever existed in the first place. But, in answer to the question, ""What have the Romans ever done for us?" Scheidel replies: "fall and go away."" -- |
目次
Patterns of Empire | 31 |
Core | 51 |
Periphery | 89 |
Counterfactuals | 110 |
From Justinian to Frederick | 127 |
From Genghis Khan to Napoleon | 174 |
and Qing empires | 229 |
million km² at 100year intervals 5001500 CE | 274 |
New Worlds | 420 |
its axis at 75E | 460 |
Understanding | 472 |
What Have the Romans Ever Done for Us? | 503 |
Glossary | 529 |
Notes | 537 |
| 603 | |
| 647 | |
他の版 - すべて表示
多く使われている語句
Abbasid allies Arab Britain caliphate capacity capital Carthage cavalry central century BCE chapter Chinese city-states competition conflict conquest regimes contrast core counterfactual cultural Divergence dominant dynasty early modern East Asia eastern economic elite emperor England Europe's European expansion favored fiscal forces formation Former Qin fragmentation France frontier German Greek growth hegemonic hegemonic empire Iberian Iberian peninsula imperial Industrial innovation institutions Italy kilometers land late later Latin Europe medieval Mediterranean military millennium million Ming mobilization Mokyr Mongol North northern China Ottoman outcomes overall overseas peninsula percent period political polycentrism population post-Roman Europe Qing quote region revenue role Roman empire Rome Rome's Rosenthal and Wong Rouran rule rulers scale Scheidel Seleucid Song South Asia southern square kilometers steppe sustained Tang taxation territory tion trade traditional Tuoba Turkic Umayyad urban volume Vries warfare Warring States period Western Wickham Xianbei Xiongnu Zanden zone