Year: 2015
Type: article
Abstract: World history today has been greatly influenced by the fact that it was the revolution in naval power during the past two centuries that made the world truly global. This has led to a new master narrative that re-framed five millennia of recorded history in order to explain the ultimate triumph of the maritime economies. The result of such revision is to underestimate and distort the role of continental Eurasia in the shaping of the three key civilizations that developed independently and remain distinct: the Mediterranean, the Indic and the Sinic. Only by a fuller reappraisal of the linkages of trade and war dominated by the Eurasian central forces for most of history can we understand the global pressures perennially at work. By setting the continental and the maritime in their total historical context and recognizing their importance today, we can better explain what is happening and what is likely to continue to influence the course of world history.
Author: Gungwu WANG
Institution: National University of Singapore
Language: English
Subfield: Anthropology
Field: Social Sciences
Domain: Social Sciences
Open Access status: bronze
OpenAlex ID: W2345556799