Re: Re: guns, germs, steel
Date: Wed, 12 Apr 2000 11:26:58 -0400 From: "Charles Brown" [EMAIL PROTECTED] To:[EMAIL PROTECTED] Subject: [PEN-L:18012] Re: guns, germs, steel Reply-to: [EMAIL PROTECTED] The US being what it is - real paranoia over race - I guess it is better to leave this subject untouched. "Ricardo Duchesne" [EMAIL PROTECTED] 04/12/00 10:23AM Simply saying that one can, as Diamond does, draw a rough line accross the African continent to distinguish "white" Africa from "black" Africa proper. Egyptians, Tunisians, Moroccans, Libyans and others in the Northern areas are "white". No. They're not. They're Mediterranean--it's really easy for them to trade, fight, and learn from people from all over Eurasia... In quotation marks because Diamond knows that "...the divisions between blacks, whites, and other major groups are arbitrary...", so I, following D, have no objections to your qualification/distinction. But to the impertinent people here who have decided that Diamond is this or that, or is a racist (!), without even reading him, let me cite this CB: It is not impertinent to describe your report of his book as describing a racist concept. When you ( or whomever) says: Simply saying that one can, as Diamond does, draw a rough line accross the African continent to distinguish "white" Africa from "black" Africa proper. Egyptians, Tunisians, Moroccans, Libyans and others in the Northern areas are "white". if he does draw such a line, it is racist line drawing. To draw a line rougly distinguishing "white" Africa from "black" Africa is crudely racist compared with saying that African harbored five of the world's six major division of humanity " . But even the notion of "six major divisions of humanity" is an old, racist anthro concept . There are not "six major divisions of humanity" recognized b modern , physical anthropology. That sounds like Carleton Coon. CB : "But very different peoples may have occupied much of modern black Africa until as recently as a few thousand years ago, and so-called African blacks themselves are heterogeneous. Even before the arrival of white colonialists, *Africa already harbored not just blacks but five of the world's six major divisions of humanity, and three of them are confined as natives to Africa. One quarter of the world's languages are spoken only in Africa. No other continent approaches this human diversity."* Nor is Diamond Eurocentric: "Concealed at the top of Figure 19.2 is our first surprise, a big shock for Eurocentric believers in the superiority of so-called Western civilization. We're taught that Western civilization originated in the Near east, was brought to brilliant heights in Europe by the Greeks and Romans, and produced three of the worl's great religions: Christianity, Judaism, and Islam. Those religions arose among peoples speaking three closely related languages, termed Semitic languages: Aramic (the language of Christ and the Apostles), Hebrew, and Arabic, respectively. We instinctively associate Semitic peoples with the Near East. *However, Greenberg determined that Semitic languages really form only one of six or more branches of a much larger language family, Afro-asiatic, all of whose other branches (and other 222 surviving languages) are confined to Africa. Even the Semitic subfamily itself is mainly African, 12 of its 19 surviving languages being confined to Ethiopia. This suggests that Afroasiatic languages arose in Africa, and that only one branch of them speard to the Near East. Hence it may have been Africa that gave birth to the languages spoken by the authors of the Old and New Testament and the Koran, the moral pillars of Western civilization"*
Re: Re: guns, germs, steel
"Ricardo Duchesne" [EMAIL PROTECTED] 04/12/00 12:42PM The US being what it is - real paranoia over race - I guess it is better to leave this subject untouched. ___ CB: Paranoia , in the sense of irrational and unfounded fear, is not an accurate way to describe the US on race. What you have in the US is white supremacy or racism ; and the victims of it , people of color, particularly Black and Red are not "paranoid" ,but have wellfounded fears and protests. Logically, therefore, scholars and intellectuals of color militantly critique books, lectures and other intellectual expressions that express and reflect this white supremacy or racism. Even liberal scholars can reflect white supremacy, such that one part of their work is anti-racist, but mixed with it are racist concepts. The dualism of liberals on race is a well-settled phenomenon. CB
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Logically, therefore, scholars and intellectuals of color militantly critique books, lectures and other intellectual expressions that express and reflect this white supremacy or racism. Even liberal scholars can reflect white supremacy, such that one part of their work is anti-racist, but mixed with it are racist concepts. The dualism of liberals on race is a well-settled phenomenon. CB And when they accuse anti-racist authors *whom* *they* *have* *not* *read* of racism, they look *really* *stupid*... Brad DeLong
Re: Re: Re: guns, germs, steel
Brad De Long [EMAIL PROTECTED] 04/12/00 12:33PM Logically, therefore, scholars and intellectuals of color militantly critique books, lectures and other intellectual expressions that express and reflect this white supremacy or racism. Even liberal scholars can reflect white supremacy, such that one part of their work is anti-racist, but mixed with it are racist concepts. The dualism of liberals on race is a well-settled phenomenon. CB And when they accuse anti-racist authors *whom* *they* *have* *not* *read* of racism, they look *really* *stupid*... __ CB: And when "they" say : "And when they accuse anti-racist authors *whom* *they* *have* *not* *read* of racism, they look *really* *stupid*..." They look really (*^%$(+#@ and not capable of judging us as stupid ; nor do "they" have a good record on these lists of judging who is anti-racist and who is not. In fact when "they" say someone is anti-racist, I get suspicious, as would Henry Liu and Jim Craven and... and... In other words, you don't have good judgment about who and what are and are not racist. And if the statement Simply saying that one can, as Diamond does, draw a rough line accross the African continent to distinguish "white" Africa from "black" Africa proper. Egyptians, Tunisians, Moroccans, Libyans and others in the Northern areas are "white". if accurate, is a racist line drawing. CB
Re: Re: guns, germs, steel
Sam Pawlett wrote: I forgot to add that the Carling theory seems to beg the question since some societies have a higher level of pf's [productive forces] because they select out others without explaining how theses socities became that way in the first place. Diamond initially explains why some countries have a higher level of productive forces in terms of the plants and animals available, the geography, the climate, etc. (He does not emphasize the role of genetic differences between peoples (except for the role of resistance to diseases) or even cultural differences. Some cultures are more open to technical progress, but he treats this as a random variable. He presumes that all individual humans are basically the same in terms of seeking ways to improve their lives.) He then sees advantages as accumulating (as when the shift from hunting gathering to food production then encourages the improvement of farming). It should be stressed that in Diamond's work, the concept of "higher level of productive forces" does not appear. If he had used that term, "higher" would have been defined in terms of allowing a group to spread, grow in population, and conquer others. As I noted in my original review (available at http://clawww.lmu.edu/~JDevine/notes/gunsreview.html), technical progress is implicitly defined in similar terms. That seems inadequate. Jim Devine [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://liberalarts.lmu.edu/~jdevine
Re: Re: guns, germs, steel
Ricardo writes: I dont know if this is a work of "total genius" but it is certainly a masterful explanation for the differing patterns of development of the continents of the world. But what is so troubling for many in the left about this book is that it proves beyond a doubt that Africa's backwardness was a result of its ecology - i.e., lack of domesticable animals among other things - and not some mythical "underdevelopment" process. I don't see Diamond's book as contradicting the "underdevelopment of underdevelopment" theory. He only deals with the issue of why Eurasia got the initial advantage over Africa. After that advantage arises, then the "U of U" process takes place. Wallerstein and Diamond can reach a compromise, though I doubt that A.G. Frank and Diamond could do so. I dont think one has to take this remark about the superiority of New Guiineans literally; Diamond is just playing with the idea: 'if you want to argue that Europeans are superior because of this and that trait or achievement, well, let me tell you that New Guineans look pretty smart when you consider this and that trait behavior of theirs' but that's all, nothing serious. I didn't take it seriously. I thought he was "bending the stick" to contradict the bias of his readers. Yes, Diamand explains well why Euroasia developed faster than every other continent of the world, but once he gets to the question of why Europe was the only area within Eurasia that industrialized, his argument starts to breakdown. Which is understandable since this is not his area, it also covers only a chapter or two of the book. The ecological approach works better for pre-1500 world history, but not after that date. yup. The rise of industrialization is treated simply as a "natural" outcome of the rise of farming (food production). I wrote: This is the beginning of his incomplete discussion of why Europe won out in the competition amongst all the Eurasian subregions. Within the context of his framework, however, one could easily say that Europe just happened to be _lucky_, to conquer most of Eurasia before some part of the rest of Eurasian conquered it, especially given the advantage of being relatively close to the New World (which in his framework was destined to be conquered by _some_ part of Eurasia). If Europe had been further from the Americas, perhaps a continent-wide empire could have been solidified which ended intra-European competition, so that non-Europeans could have won. Ricardo: A major problem with Diamond is the lack of attention given to the massive literature that already exists on this subject. He wrongly thinks that a natural scientific focus will also work to explain continental differences after 1500 (actually his explanation of the rise of civilization is also limited for the same reason, including other logical flaws - like his argument that competition among chiefdoms eventually led to the rise of state/civilization, which fails to address the fact that in many areas of the world chiefdoms were competing endlessly with no state ever coming into shape.) Again, I think a major flaw in his book is his refusal to learn/acknowldge the many other scholars who have investigated this set of questions and from whom he could have learned a lot more, but he really wants to say that everything he says is uniquely his own. I think it was a good idea for him to limit the scope of his book. If he'd tried to get farther beyond 1500, the book would have been much much longer, to its detriment. BTW, he talks a lot about the persistence of "backward" situations (here, the existence of chiefdoms) even though full-scale states had arisen. He doesn't posit some sort of theory of automatic "progress." In fact, one of the strong points of this theory is that he explains "regression." Isolated areas can remain "backward." ... really never tells us why individuals engage in war; in fact, war is a crucial dynamic in his whole explanation of the rise of states (and of many other questins he tries to answer like how Africa became black, and China became Chinese). This is where his tacit Malthusianism comes in. Jim Devine [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://liberalarts.lmu.edu/~jdevine
Re: Re: guns, germs, steel
Once every couple of weeks I play chess with John and Jeffrey. Jeffrey is a long-time Nation subscriber and John, a lawyer by profession, is the kind of New Yorker who voted for Giuliani. I usually let the two of them argue politics since the gap between John and me is too wide to allow civil debate. A couple of weeks ago, against my better judgement, I attempted to explain to him why the Kennewick Man's bones should stay out of the hands of "scientists". John has a tremendous ability to ferret out books that answer his 'bete noires', Afrocentrists, left-liberals like Jeffrey and anybody else who thinks that white society is responsible for black peoples' woes. He snapped up Jim Sleeper's "Liberal Racism" while the ink was still wet and has committed Mary Lefkowitz's screed against Martin Bernal to memory. As soon as it came out, he began waving Jared Diamond's book in our face. "See," he shouted, "we had nothing to do with black people's suffering." I do know that Jim Blaut makes a few dismissive comments in Diamond's direction. Myself, I have yet to see anything in the reviews that would make me want to delve into his book. I first stumbled across Diamond about ten years ago, when reviews portrayed him as a sociobiologist in the Robert Ardrey mold. Here's one to give you a flavor for how he was perceived in the press. I am just not motivated to read these characters, who seem to be a subspecies of social Darwinism. Financial Times (London) June 1, 1991, Saturday Books; A 'Naked Ape' for grown-ups By ANDREW CLEMENTS THE RISE AND FALL OF THE THIRD CHIMPANZEE by Jared Diamond Radius Pounds 16.99, 360 pages A NAKED Ape for grown-ups, Jared Diamond's fascinating examination of Homo sapiens as large mammal delves into all those areas of human behaviour that Desmond Morris exposed so titillatingly to public gaze 25 years ago. Human socio-biology has come a long way since then and Diamond, a physiologist by training and ornithologist by parallel career, has laced its disparate strands into a fascinating portrait with more than enough uncomfortable facts to stop any dinner-party conversation right in its tracks. To a disinterested observer from another planet, he reminds us, humanity would be classified as just another large ape, a very close cousin to the chimpanzees. We share more than 98 per cent of our genes with the two chimp species, giving a closer correlation than between birds like the Chiffchaff and Willow Warbler that are indistinguishable to the casual observer. But that extra two per cent has made all the difference, and has been responsible for everything that stems from our upright posture, larger brains and strange sex and social lives. Those behavioural differences, Diamond argues, have been at least as important as sheer brain capacity in lifting us above our congeners. (clip) Louis Proyect (The Marxism mailing list: http://www.marxmail.org)
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What I got from the Diamond book was not The Naked Ape, but more of an environmental history. The European/Asian regions that developed had access to large draft animals and easily harvested seeds. Close proximity to the large mammals created diseases for which these people had immunity, making conquest easier. Nonetheless, he allows for culture. The best example, which Jim already mentioned, was the Japanese who developed sophisticated firearms and then outlawed them. Nonetheless, the emphasis on military equipment and genetics could lead to the misreading by Lou's chess buddy. -- Michael Perelman Economics Department California State University [EMAIL PROTECTED] Chico, CA 95929 530-898-5321 fax 530-898-5901
Re: Re: Re: guns, germs, steel
Quoth Louis P: As soon as it came out, he began waving Jared Diamond's book in our face. "See," he shouted, "we had nothing to do with black people's suffering." His interpretation of the book is wrong. It sounds like he hadn't read the book. It's always a big mistake to praise (or, for that matter, dismiss) a book without reading it. It's the Bob Dole style of reviewing. I do know that Jim Blaut makes a few dismissive comments in Diamond's direction. what were they? are they valid? I am just not motivated to read these characters, who seem to be a subspecies of social Darwinism. I don't know about Diamond's previous book(s), but _Guns, Germs, and Steel_ is not social Darwinism, since Eurasian "superiority" is only in terms of "might makes right" and acquired immunities. He does reject the good guys vs. bad guys interpretation of history. Louis quotes a FINANCIAL TIMES review of Diamond's "Third Chimp" book: To a disinterested observer from another planet, he reminds us, humanity would be classified as just another large ape, a very close cousin to the chimpanzees. We share more than 98 per cent of our genes with the two chimp species, giving a closer correlation than between birds like the Chiffchaff and Willow Warbler that are indistinguishable to the casual observer. But that extra two per cent has made all the difference, and has been responsible for everything that stems from our upright posture, larger brains and strange sex and social lives. Those behavioural differences, Diamond argues, have been at least as important as sheer brain capacity in lifting us above our congeners. It would be interesting to compare Diamond's perspective with that of Engels on the transition from ape to human. Engels, if I remember correctly, embraced the then-popular Lamarckian theory of evolution (since he didn't know about Gregor Mendel's work). But otherwise Engels' manuscript (which Stephen J. Gould says is pretty good once you get past the Lamarckism) doesn't seem to contradict Diamond as sketched above. Is there an expert in the house? Jim Devine [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://liberalarts.lmu.edu/~jdevine
Re: Re: guns, germs, steel
I dont know if this is a work of "total genius" but it is certainly a masterful explanation for the differing patterns of development of the continents of the world. But what is so troubling for many in the left about this book is that it proves beyond a doubt that Africa's backwardness was a result of its ecology - i.e., lack of domesticable animals among other things - and not some mythical "underdevelopment" process. Diamond's argument is that ecology and distance explain Africans' relatively poor command over technology as of 1500. The underdevelopment comes later, with the triangle trade and its effect on west Africa. And this has always been the part of Diamond's argument that I have had the most doubts about. East Africa seems to me at least to have been part of the Eurasian ekumene--why else would the largest city on the east African coast, the House of Peace, have a name from a language whose heartland is two thousand miles north? Brad DeLong
Re: Re: Re: guns, germs, steel
I do know that Jim Blaut makes a few dismissive comments in Diamond's direction. Myself, I have yet to see anything in the reviews that would make me want to delve into his book. I first stumbled across Diamond about ten years ago, when reviews portrayed him as a sociobiologist in the Robert Ardrey mold. Here's one to give you a flavor for how he was perceived in the press. I am just not motivated to read these characters, who seem to be a subspecies of social Darwinism. Well, you are wrong. That ain't Diamond... Brad DeLong
Re: Re: guns, germs, steel
the east African coast, the House of Peace, have a name from a language whose heartland is two thousand miles north? Because, he would say, that region is not Africa, that is, Black Africa. Why isn't Dar-es-Salaam considered part of Black Africa? For that matter, what constitutes Black Africa? I think it might make sense to distinguish Subsaharan Africa from North Africa, but from a socioeconomic perspective Dar-es-Salaam and Timbuktu certainly can be grouped together. More relevant to the question under consideration is what happened to places like Timbuktu or Dar-es-Salaam historically. While they were not as central to world trade as Kalkut or Malacca, neither could they be accurately described as "backward". After visiting Timbuktu in 1352, Abu Ibn Battuta wrote in his "Book of Travels", "There is complete security in their country. Neither traveler nor inhabitant in it has anything to fear from robbers or men of violence." Two centuries later, a Spanish Moor, Wazzan Zayyati -- known by the pen name Leo Africanus -- praised the city as a haven for "a great store of doctors, judges, priests and other learned men that are bountifully maintained at the king's expense." Timbuktu's scholars taught thousands of students and maintained large private libraries. That era ended in 1591, when a Moroccan army destroyed Songhai, the empire that housed Timbuktu. Portuguese navigators accelerated its descent into poverty by destroying the city's commercial viability, in much the same manner as Great Britain did in India after the Battle of Plessy. Timbuktu's fall was about conquest by human beings, not germs. Louis Proyect (The Marxism mailing list: http://www.marxmail.org)
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CB: Thanks for this book review, Jim. you're welcome I was a little unclear. At first it seemed you were saying that the author was explaining the conquests of the last 500 years. Then there seems to be discussion going back to the origin of agriculture , which is 7,000 years ago or so. Anyway, this list had a very rich debate on the cause of European conquest over the last 500 years, as you know. It would be hard to explain it as geographical. But I may not have understood the author's argument in the book. To Diamond, the conquests of the last 500 years ago arose because Eurasia (especially Europe) gained its advantage in the previous 7,000 years or so. So Europe could then accumulate advantages at Africa's expense (the development of underdevelopment). As I said, there's not really a contradiction between Diamond (whose emphasis is before 1500) and people like Wallerstein (whose emphasis is after 1500). But obviously, they'd have to go to a counsellor to make the marriage work... Geographical determinism is a bit tricky. It gets tricky to make a causal link between geography and a "conquering" mentality or cultural value. You probably know that there have been ecological schools in anthropology and archeology for a long time ( You mention Childe and Carneiro ;See the reader _Prehistoric Agriculture_ edited by Stuart Struever, or Ecological Anthropology edited by Yehudi Cohen). Anthropologists/Archeologists might be defending their turf , as you mention, but on the other hand , as you say, the topic you summarize is not at all a new subject for anthro/archeo. right. Marvin Harris, one of my favorite reads in the subject, is an ecological anthro-type (with a much greater emphasis on culture than Diamond). I don't think Diamond explains the "conquering mentality." The expansionary drive is _assumed_ as part of his tacit Malthusianism, i.e., that a successful society tends to have too many children, so that it looks for new lands to conquer (along with improvements in technology and organization). To me, Malthusianism goes out the window as even a partly valid theory with the agricultural revolutions that preceded the industrial revolutions of the 19th century in Europe. But the establishment of capitalism in Western Europe created a new kind of expansionary -- conquering -- drive. There is a logical link between agriculture and exploiting classes, because agriculture produces surpluses and non-productive classes are based on surpluses. Diamond agrees. Why does he say "Eurasians" and not "Europeans" conquered the Western Hemisphere ? ... And before the last 500 years the Europeans were not dominant. His theory only explains the Eurasian ascendancy. He has a very incomplete explanation of why the Europeans were on the cutting edge of that ascendancy in 1500. That's not really what his book is about. The discussion of Europe comes only in the epilogue. The fact that the Europeans conquered Africa and Asia ( which had had agriculture and the diseases you mention), as well as America ( the Central Americans and Peruvian/Colombian etc. Indians had agriculture too) seems to imply that there was something beyond agriculture and diseases that differentiated the Europeans from all the rest in the last 500 years. He argues that because of the ecological/geographical disunity of the Americas (mostly because of the North-South axis), the opportunities for developing a variety of different seeds was higher in Eurasia. Having more variety, there's a better chance of getting really good crops. This disunity also meant that maize took a really long time to spread from Mexico to what is now the Eastern U.S. More fundamentally, the Americas had fewer animals that were useful. And communication was hard going North to South: as he said, the Aztecs had wheels, but they remained toys because they had no animals to pull the carts. The Incas had such animals (llamas, alpacas), but didn't communicate at all with the Aztecs. Even so, llamas seem inferior as beasts of burden to horses or oxen. Europe didn't totally conquer Asia (cf. China, Thailand, Japan). And it only conquered the central part of Africa after the rise of modern medicine, which created a way to fight tropical diseases. Jim Devine [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://liberalarts.lmu.edu/~jdevine
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1) I have not followed the entire thread closely. Is a distinction being made between pre- and post-Arabicization/Islamicization? 2) This is factually incorrect in either case. Ricardo Duchesne wrote: Egyptians, Tunisians, Moroccans, Libyans and others in the Northern areas are "white".
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Ricardo says that Diamond is a direct challenge to dependency theory. I think that he would agree that institutions play a larger role after 1600 than before. He deals with before that time. I've been browsing through Lexis-Nexis this afternoon on and off trying to get a handle on Diamond. It appears that his theory lends itself to rather clearcut differences between let's say the British settlers and the aborigines of Australia and why one group conquered another. However, it seems rather banal to spend 900 pages or so making this argument. This, however, is not what is gnawing at people involved in trying to understand why Europe prevailed. It has to do with Europe's relationship to India and China. The one thing I didn't mention in my note on Frank earlier is the powerful mass of evidence he produces on behalf of the argument that between 1400 and 1800 China and India were more "advanced" than Europe. Not only did they produce more wealth, they were also more efficient from a Weberian standpoint. Although Diamond's book is meant to explain how these roles were reversed, I can't see how. Animals were domesticated in Asia as well as Europe. China had the largest iron foundaries in the world in the 1600s. I would suggest that the biggest problem with Diamond's book is that it encourages a fatalistic attitude. The inequality of nations is attributed to the "luck of the draw". Some people were lucky enough to be born in hospitable geographical locales while others bought losing tickets. While it is commendable that he wrote the book in order to refute racist myths about the superiority of whites, we should realize that very few people nowadays preach racial superiority. Our main problem is not the kind of ideology that prevailed in the 19th century, but rather one that adapts to the status quo. Louis Proyect (The Marxism mailing list: http://www.marxmail.org)
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I agree with Lou. But on this an interesting exchange took place in Toronto Star a few years ago. A Somalian refugee wrote a letter chastising the black community for not doing more for refugees from that part of the world. Some one responded that it was because they did not consider Somalians and Ethiopians to be black. I haven't been able to figure it out, but that is what it said. Rod Hay Louis Proyect wrote: the east African coast, the House of Peace, have a name from a language whose heartland is two thousand miles north? Because, he would say, that region is not Africa, that is, Black Africa. Why isn't Dar-es-Salaam considered part of Black Africa? For that matter, what constitutes Black Africa? I think it might make sense to distinguish Subsaharan Africa from North Africa, but from a socioeconomic perspective Dar-es-Salaam and Timbuktu certainly can be grouped together. -- Rod Hay [EMAIL PROTECTED] The History of Economic Thought Archive http://socserv2.mcmaster.ca/~econ/ugcm/3ll3/index.html Batoche Books http://Batoche.co-ltd.net/ 52 Eby Street South Kitchener, Ontario N2G 3L1 Canada
Re: Re: guns, germs, steel
Jim Devine [EMAIL PROTECTED] 04/10/00 03:22PM I was a little unclear. At first it seemed you were saying that the author was explaining the conquests of the last 500 years. Then there seems to be discussion going back to the origin of agriculture , which is 7,000 years ago or so. Anyway, this list had a very rich debate on the cause of European conquest over the last 500 years, as you know. It would be hard to explain it as geographical. But I may not have understood the author's argument in the book. To Diamond, the conquests of the last 500 years ago arose because Eurasia (especially Europe) gained its advantage in the previous 7,000 years or so. So Europe could then accumulate advantages at Africa's expense (the development of underdevelopment). _ CB: There's something wrong with Diamond's reasoning here. Who had the advantage during the previous 7000 years ? Or was there no advantage ? For most of the 7000 years, Africa, in Egypt, had the "higher" civilization ( and it was higher in part because they didn't have as much of an urge to conquer, i.e. were more peaceful). Then they were about "even". As to "Asia" , Africa and Asia were about "even" through most of the 7000 years. Asia never conquered Africa or vice versa. But at any rate, for most of the time the ecology of Europe was not an advantage. So, the "accumulation" based on ecology and geography idea seems flawed. Accumulating ecological and geographical advantages isn't logical _ Geographical determinism is a bit tricky. It gets tricky to make a causal link between geography and a "conquering" mentality or cultural value. You probably know that there have been ecological schools in anthropology and archeology for a long time ( You mention Childe and Carneiro ;See the reader _Prehistoric Agriculture_ edited by Stuart Struever, or Ecological Anthropology edited by Yehudi Cohen). Anthropologists/Archeologists might be defending their turf , as you mention, but on the other hand , as you say, the topic you summarize is not at all a new subject for anthro/archeo. right. Marvin Harris, one of my favorite reads in the subject, is an ecological anthro-type (with a much greater emphasis on culture than Diamond). CB: Yes, I must admit though that even Harris is vulgar materialist in my schema now, though _ The Rise and Fall of Anthropological Theory_ was one of my first theory book. So, Diamond's thesis is really vulgar, ecological/geographical determinism. _ I don't think Diamond explains the "conquering mentality." The expansionary drive is _assumed_ as part of his tacit Malthusianism, i.e., that a successful society tends to have too many children, so that it looks for new lands to conquer (along with improvements in technology and organization). To me, Malthusianism goes out the window as even a partly valid theory with the agricultural revolutions that preceded the industrial revolutions of the 19th century in Europe. But the establishment of capitalism in Western Europe created a new kind of expansionary -- conquering -- drive. _ CB: Yes, Diamond is really getting tangled here. For, 7, 6, 5, 4, 3, 2, 000 years ago, there were plenty of places for successful populaton growing societies to migrate to without conquering other people ( and I believe you say Diamond is not focussed on the last 500 years as that is the reason he doesn't contradict Wallerstein). So, a conquering mentality does not automatically follow even from population growth. Also, conquering other peoples increases your population more, as opposed to spinning off groups to unoccupied land. Seems to me conquest mentality is a byproduct of a society with exploiting classes. Getting people, not land. Even the ancients new that humans, not nature , is the source of surplus values. (Marx got the distinction between use-value and exchange-value from Aristotle). _ Why does he say "Eurasians" and not "Europeans" conquered the Western Hemisphere ? ... And before the last 500 years the Europeans were not dominant. His theory only explains the Eurasian ascendancy. _ CB: But there is no fact of "Eurasian" ascendancy. In the period, before 500 years ago, Africa was on top as much as Asia and more than Europe. He is empirically wrong. After 500 years ago it is just Europe , not Asia that ascends. His "Eurasian" category seems to be an ideological ( not scientific) anti-Africanism. ___ He has a very incomplete explanation of why the Europeans were on the cutting edge of that ascendancy in 1500. That's not really what his book is about. The discussion of Europe comes only in the epilogue. _ CB: So, it seems the main period of his book is based on a gross historical inaccuracy. There is no "Eurasian" unit superior to Africa before 1500. The fact that the Europeans conquered Africa and Asia ( which had had agriculture and
Re: Re: guns, germs, steel
I agree with Lou. But on this an interesting exchange took place in Toronto Star a few years ago. A Somalian refugee wrote a letter chastising the black community for not doing more for refugees from that part of the world. Some one responded that it was because they did not consider Somalians and Ethiopians to be black. I haven't been able to figure it out, but that is what it said. Rod Hay The cultural history of Ethiopia and its connections with the black community in the US is extremely complex and interesting. There are several factors that create an inner tension that has never quite been resolved: 1. Ethiopia under the Solomonic dynasties was not only allied with European Christian nations, it viewed non-Christian nationalities in the southern regions as inferior, even though they were racially indistinguishable. 2. Ethiopia was the only nation that resisted colonialism successfully. At the battle of Adwa in 1896, the Italians were sent packing. This served to inspire black people everywhere, including Marcus Garvey. Garvey and Haile Selassie became heroes to the Rastafarians in Jamaica. (Ras Tafari was Selassie's name before becoming emperor.) 3. Despite the solidarity with Ethiopia, their emperors never oriented to the grass roots of the black community in the Americas. Selassie identified with the ruling classes and collaborated closely with the militaries in Great Britain and the US. So despite the symbolic importance of the name Abyssinian Baptist Church (Adam Clayton Powell's parish), Selassie never spent time there. Louis Proyect (The Marxism mailing list: http://www.marxmail.org)
Re: Re: guns, germs, steel
Brad writes: Ken Pomeranz's _The Great Divergence_ develops it to some degree--that the very *success* of India and China at mobilizing resources gave them large populations, and that Europe's earlier lack of success at mobilizing resources gave at an extra edge of free resources that helped propel it forward in the early modern period... this doesn't contradict Diamond, for what it's worth. His emphasis, however, is on how the unity of the Chinese empire (success) implied later failure due to lack of dynamism. In addition, I want to mention that Diamond doesn't really deal with India at all. Jim Devine [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://liberalarts.lmu.edu/~jdevine
Re: Re: guns, germs, steel
Jim Devine [EMAIL PROTECTED] 04/10/00 05:05PM this doesn't contradict Diamond, for what it's worth. His emphasis, however, is on how the unity of the Chinese empire (success) implied later failure due to lack of dynamism. __ CB: This is consistent with the "law" of evolutionary potential. CB
Re: Re: Re: Re: guns, germs, steel
I've been browsing through Lexis-Nexis this afternoon on and off trying to
get a handle on Diamond. It appears that his theory lends itself to rather
clearcut differences between let's say the British settlers and the
aborigines of Australia and why one group conquered another. However, it
seems rather banal to spend 900 pages or so making this argument.
Whether it's banal or not depends on whether you're interested in the
subject or not.
This, however, is not what is gnawing at people involved in trying to
understand why Europe prevailed. It has to do with Europe's relationship
to India and China. The one thing I didn't mention in my note on Frank
earlier is the powerful mass of evidence he produces on behalf of the
argument that between 1400 and 1800 China and India were more "advanced"
than Europe. Not only did they produce more wealth, they were also more
efficient from a Weberian standpoint. Although Diamond's book is meant to
explain how these roles were reversed, I can't see how. Animals were
domesticated in Asia as well as Europe. China had the largest iron
foundaries in the world in the 1600s.
The book doesn't really aim to explore the role reversal. The discussion of
the subject is an afterthought, in the epilogue. He sketches a little bit
of answer, mostly to indicate that his theory _might_ be relevant.
Diamond actually talks a lot about the static superiority of the Chinese
political economy to that of Europe in say, 1600, and the large number of
important innovations that China developed in the centuries before that.
(BTW, as I've noted before, even Adam Smith was aware of China's wealth in
1776.) He really doesn't try to explain how the roles were reversed (as I
noted) except to say that excessive unity and hierarchy led to dynamic
problems, as when the Empire called off its foreign explorations in search
of "treasure." These dynamic problems meant that China would fall behind
the more aggressively dynamic Europeans.
I would suggest that the biggest problem with Diamond's book is that it
encourages a fatalistic attitude. The inequality of nations is attributed
to the "luck of the draw". Some people were lucky enough to be born in
hospitable geographical locales while others bought losing tickets. While
it is commendable that he wrote the book in order to refute racist myths
about the superiority of whites, we should realize that very few people
nowadays preach racial superiority. Our main problem is not the kind of
ideology that prevailed in the 19th century, but rather one that adapts to
the status quo.
I wish that ideologies of racial supremacy were that rare. Didn't some
folks write a book called THE BELL CURVE just a few years ago, spawning
much acclaim and, from the left, many attacks? Don't the LAPD and NYPD and
other police forces use racial profiling to target minority groups that
they and their constituencies see as racially inferior? As someone whose
father was racist, I see any contribution to the battle against racism as
positive.
In any event, as I noted, because Diamond doesn't deal with either the
"development of underdevelopment" process or capitalism -- both of which
really took off only at the end of the period he discusses -- his theory is
inherently irrelevant to helping us understand what's has been going on
since. So it hardly encourages fatalism unless one makes a "category error"
and applies his theories to a situation to which his theory is
irrelevant. (I know that I didn't feel more fatalistic after reading the
book.)
Finally, I don't think it's valid to judge the quality of anyone's logic or
empirical research solely on the basis of the political conclusions
("fatalism") that one perceives can be drawn from that work. This is
especially true given the way exactly the same theory -- e.g., the theory
of the tendential fall in the rate of profit under capitalism -- can be
interpreted politically in several different ways. One of these
interpretations includes fatalism, BTW.
Jim Devine [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://liberalarts.lmu.edu/~jdevine
Re: Re: guns, germs, steel
Because, he would say, that region is not Africa, that is, Black Africa. __ CB: What does being BLACK Africa have to do with "ecological/geographical conditions" ? Sounds like Diamond has an inconsistent and racist theory. Simply saying that one can, as Diamond does, draw a rough line accross the African continent to distinguish "white" Africa from "black" Africa proper. Egyptians, Tunisians, Moroccans, Libyans and others in the Northern areas are "white". No. They're not. They're Mediterranean--it's really easy for them to trade, fight, and learn from people from all over Eurasia...
Re: Re: guns, germs, steel
Michael wrote: Jim Devine wrote have mentioned one other slightly Marx-like touch: Diamond observes that a surplus is required before the superstructure of the state can be erected. However, Diamond seems to be more of a materialist than a Marxist since he does not concern himself with either class or social relations. he deals with both class and social relations. However, the only time he deals with class is the pre-capitalist case in which the economic ruling class and the political governing class are merged into one kleptocracy (kingships, etc.) He doesn't deal with the case of capitalism, in which the state and the economic ruling class seem to be separated, so that the state seems to be separate from "civil society." But in reality, the state power stands behind the capitalists. On the issue of social relations, he also deals with egalitarian pre-class societies and chiefdoms on the way to becoming states. But his analysis seems sketchier than the ecological side of his analysis. Jim Devine [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://liberalarts.lmu.edu/~JDevine/JDevine.html
