Why Europe Was First: Social Change and Economic Growth in Europe and East Asia 1500-2050: 2 (Anthem European Studies, 1) - Softcover

Ringmar, Erik

Softcover

ISBN 10: 1843312417 ISBN 13: 9781843312413

Publisher: Anthem Press, 2007

Synopsis

For most of its history Europe was a thoroughly average part of the world: poor, uncouth, technologically and culturally backward. By contrast, China was always far richer, more sophisticated and advanced. Yet it was Europe that first became modern, and by the nineteenth century China was struggling to catch up. This book explains why. Why did Europe succeed and why was China left behind? The answer, as we will see, does not only solve a long-standing historical puzzle, it also provides an explanation of the contemporary success of East Asia, and it shows what is wrong with current theories of development and modernization.

About this title

About the Author

Erik Ringmar is a Professor at the National Chiao Tung Unviersity, Hsinchu, Taiwan.

From the Back Cover

'A thought-provoking and well-written book that provides a unique and idiosyncratic contribution to world history.'
"Professor John M. Honson, author of 'The Eastern Origins of Western Civilization'"
'Ringmar provides the most concise and powerful explanation that I have read, and in enjoyable and skillfully-wrought prose. This is an intellectual feast.'
"Jack A. Goldstone, Hazel Professor, George Mason University"
For most of its history Europe was a thoroughly average part of the world: poor, uncouth, technologically and culturally backward. By contrast, China was always far richer, more sophisticated and advanced. Yet it was Europe that first became modern, and by the nineteenth century China was struggling to catch up. This book explains why. Why did Europe succeed and why was China left behind? The answer, as we will see, does not only solve a long-standing historical puzzle, it also provides an explanation of the contemporary success of East Asia, and it shows what is wrong with current theories of development and modernization.
Erik Ringmar teaches political economy and cultural sociology at National Chiao Tung University, Hsinchu, Taiwan. He received a PhD from Yale University in 1993 and between 1995 and 2006 he taught at the London School of Economics and Political Science. His "Surviving Capitalism: How We Learned to Live with the Market and Remained Almost Human "was published by Anthem Press in 2005.

Excerpt. © Reprinted by permission. All rights reserved.

Why Europe Was First

Social Change and Economic Growth in Europe and East Asia 1500-2050

By Erik Ringmar

Wimbledon Publishing Company

Copyright © 2007 Erik Ringmar
All rights reserved.

ISBN: 978-1-84331-241-3

Contents

the logic, 
1. The Nature & Origin of Modern Society, 1, 
2. The Failure & Success of East Asia, 13, 
3. The Self-Transforming Machine, 27, 
reflection, 
4. The Discovery of Distance, 43, 
5. The Face in the Mirror, 61, 
6. Institutions that Reflect, 75, 
entrepreneurship, 
7. Origins of the Entrepreneurial Outlook, 95, 
8. The Age of the Demiurge, 113, 
9. Institutions that Get Things Done, 131, 
pluralism, 
10. A World in Pieces, 151, 
11. The Polite Alternative, 171, 
12. Institutions that Deal with Conflicts, 187, 
european paths to modernity, 
13. Institutions & Revolutions, 205, 
China, 
14. Reflection, 221, 
15. Entrepreneurship, 243, 
16. Pluralism, 259, 
17. Europe & China Compared, 275, 
reform & revolution in Japan & China, 
18. Foreign Challenges, Japanese Responses, 293, 
19. Japan & China in a Modern World, 309, 
the future of modern society, 
20. The New Politics of Modernization, 325, 
Notes, 339, 
Bibliography, 369, 
Index, 393, 

CHAPTER 1

The Nature & Origin of Modern Society

For most of their existence there was nothing particularly unique about European societies. In medieval Europe everybody, or nearly everybody, was a peasant, poor and illiterate with a life expectancy at birth of perhaps 35 years. The few tools that existed in peasant society required a heavy input of manpower, productivity was low and the occasional surplus was quickly gobbled up by a small, oppressive elite. What passed for science was, even among the educated, hopelessly confused with superstition and most aspects of life were heavily influenced by custom and by an all- pervasive Church. Medieval society was not static, to be sure, but changes when they occurred were ad hoc and coincidental; stability was the social norm if not always a social reality.

Then something happened which in a comparatively short time made European societies radically different both from previous versions of themselves and from other societies. Agriculture became more productive; people moved to cities to work in factories which used increasingly sophisticated production techniques; people's life expectancy increased, education improved, and science made rapid and amazing progress. Instead of being slaves to nature, the Europeans became nature's masters, and instead of living side by side with other cultures, they set off to conquer the world. No longer ad hoc and coincidental, change became continuous and progressive. This restless, ruthless, expanding and ever-changing world is the modern Western world as we know it now.

Compare East Asia. Countries such as China and Japan were always at least as "sophisticated" and "advanced" as those of Europe. In the sixteenth century the first European visitors to this part of the world acknowledged as much and were profoundly impressed with the power and wealth of East Asian rulers and with the good manners and discipline of their subjects. Yet history took quite a different turn in this part of the world. When Europe began changing rapidly, especially in the nineteenth century, East Asia seemed to remain much the same. This "failure" to emulate European examples attracted comment from observers as diverse as John Stuart Mill and G W F Hegel. Looking at their own part of the world the Europeans saw change everywhere; looking at the East they saw nothing but "stagnation" and "the despotism of custom."

Although we today are unlikely to endorse these particular conclusions, the puzzle itself remains. The differences between East Asia and Europe increased dramatically in the course of the nineteenth century. The most obvious indicator of this sudden gap is perhaps the new style of European imperialism. When sustained contact with East Asia was first established in the sixteenth century the European presence there was limited. Foreigners were banned from Japanese soil between 1639 and 1868 and in China they were strictly controlled by the authorities. In the nineteenth century, however, Europeans returned with far more ambitious plans and with the troops and gunboats to back them up. While neither China nor Japan was ever colonized formally, from this time onward elites in both countries began struggling hard to somehow "catch up" with the technically far more proficient barbarians.

This contrast gives rise to a number of questions. The most obvious ones concern why and how: Why was Europe suddenly able to develop so rapidly and how did the transformation happen? What conjunction of factors made it possible for this particular part of the world to break so radically with its past and to become so different from other societies? And why did the transformation not first take place in China or Japan which, by all accounts, were at least as well positioned for a similar take-off? These historical questions concern the nature and origin of what has come to be called a "modern" society. What makes a society modern? Why have some societies been able to modernize more quickly and effortlessly than others? The aim of this book is to answer these questions.

'Modernity' and 'The Modern'

More needs to be said about the idea of the modern. In the history of ideas references to "the modern," or a "modern age," first appear in the work of Humanist scholars of the Renaissance, and their use of the term was almost always polemical. The aim behind the phrase was to draw as sharp a contrast as possible between the activities of the Humanists themselves and the traditional Scholastic philosophers associated with the universities and the Church. The Humanists were people who admired the achievements of classical Greece and Rome and they were highly critical of the ignorance and superstition of contemporary Europeans. They believed that things could improve if only the glories of the ancients could somehow be revived, and if the future were modeled on Antiquity. The intervening period — what came to be known as the "middle ages" — could then be dismissed as an embarrassing age of darkness. The people who devoted themselves to this subversive antiquarianism were known as "the moderns."

The more the Humanists learned about the classical civilizations, the more multifaceted and realistic their picture of them became. As some of the moderns came to realize, there were actually a large number of things that the ancients did not know, could not do or had not discovered. As the English philosopher Francis Bacon pointed out in the early seventeenth century, the Greeks and the Romans knew nothing about gunpowder, the compass and the printing press. All three were recent inventions, achievements of the modern age. This ability to invent new, previously un-heard of, things gradually came to change the relationship to the ancient world. As Bacon explained, antiquity "deserves that reverence, that man should make a stand thereupon, and discover what is the best way; but when the discovery is well taken, then to make progression." From the seventeenth century onwards the future became more important than the past and the Europeans increasingly looked forward rather than backward.

In the course of the eighteenth century this forward- looking optimism was translated into a new account of history. According to the Enlightenment philosophers the past should not be understood as a disparate collection of stories about assorted peoples and events but instead as a single, unified, account of the constant improvement of mankind. To be a human being is to be a part of this universal history of progress. Through the Enlightenment, according to Immanuel Kant, man had liberated himself from his "self-imposed immaturity"; the free use of reason had replaced the slavish reliance on instinct, superstition and dogma. Through the French Revolution, according to G W F Hegel, man had for the first time become his own master, and through the state — particularly through the Prussian state — man had found a place where he could develop his full potential. The modern story of progress was soon developed in a number of competing versions which shared the same basic logic. Liberals followed Kant and saw continuous progress in the development of human rights, in political and bureaucratic rationalism, and in constant economic growth. Socialists followed Hegel but saw history as a question of material, not spiritual, development, and identified the end of history with communism not with the Prussian state.

This contemporary — this "modern" — understanding of modernity was never better expressed than through the idea of a revolution. Before the Enlightenment revolutions were under stood as movements that took a society back in time to an original and better era. The relevant metaphor was astrological: just as the revolutions of the stars always followed the same paths, the history of a society unfolded in a circular pattern. Hence the rationale of the Glorious Revolution in England in 1688 was to restore Protestantism and a notion of limited kingship, and the rationale of the American revolution of 1776 was similarly to restore the "ancient rights of all Englishmen." In intent, if not in their effects, these revolutions were reactionary.

Modern revolutions are not reactionary but progressive. The aim of all revolutionaries from 1789 onward has not been to restore something old but on the contrary to create something new, different and better. The whole point is to break with the past, its traditions and injustices, and remake the world in accordance with our own preferred design. In this bold aim the French revolutionaries were followed by twentieth-century revolutionaries in Russia, China, and a host of other countries, often with disastrous, genocidal, consequences.

Yet in modern societies revolutions are not only taking place in politics but in all walks of life: in social and economic conditions, in music, fashion and the arts. To be modern is to constantly create — or to believe that one is creating — everything anew. To be modern is to always be different from what one is; it is to be up-to- date and in touch with the latest developments; at the forefront, or the cutting edge, of that which is best, most current, sophisticated and advanced. Hence our current obsession with economic growth. The steady improvement in economic indicators has a value in itself since it gives the impression that the past is ever more remote and the future is ever closer. Every day things are getting just a little bit better and every improvement confirms our faith in the progressive movement of time. In modern society, where the future is our god, economic change becomes a daily act of worship.

The irony, and the fundamental predicament of all modern societies, is that none of us will ever be able to reach this final destination. The future is our god, but the future is unknown and so are necessarily the truths we believe in. All we have for now are preliminary theses and best guesses. In the end the object of our worship is at least as remote as were the gods of previous civilizations. The future, like Jesus Christ, will never actually come.

The Poverty of Economic Theorizing

Why was it that certain societies in Europe suddenly began changing in this relentless and ever-progressive fashion? Why did the future suddenly become something to look forward to as something different from the past, and why did people feel they had the power to influence it? And, on a more concrete and practical level, how is it possible to organize a society in such a way that it can sustain continuous social, political and cultural change?

Economists have a simple and powerful way of answering such questions. It is, they confidently declare, all a result of the development of capitalism. The development of capitalism is what makes all other aspects of society change. This was famously the view of Karl Marx who saw economic relationships as the "base" on which the "superstructure" of political, social and cultural life was founded. In Marx's own lifetime capitalism was making "all that is solid melt into air," as it undermined traditional authorities and created new wealth and new misery. And many classically trained, non-Marxist, economists have drawn much the same conclusions. The capitalist outlook, according to Joseph Schumpeter,

starts upon its conqueror's career subjugating — rationalizing — man's tools and philosophies, his medical practice, his picture of the cosmos, his outlook on life, everything in fact including his concepts of beauty and justice and his spiritual ambitions.

As both Marx and Schumpeter would have it, if Western societies have been in a perpetual state of change over the last couple of centuries it is because capitalism perpetually has changed them.

Yet as a moment's reflection makes obvious, capitalism cannot possibly be the original cause of all change. The reason is that capitalist development itself has causes. Capitalist economies are not after all growing automatically and by themselves; capitalism is not a primum mobile, an "unmoved mover." Indeed, as we know from history, sustained economic growth is a relatively rare phenomenon and most societies have, even at the beginning of the twenty-first century, yet to experience much of it. Without in any way denying the importance of capitalism and its potentially world-transforming powers, the question still has to be asked what it is that makes capitalist development possible in the first place?

At the most general level this question is easy enough to answer. Economies develop for basically two reasons: either because they come to employ more resources or because they come to employ existing resources more efficiently. When more resources are mobilized — more land, more people, more machinery — more can be produced. But production also increases if resources are used more productively - if land is made more fertile, if people are better educated or if machinery is operating more quickly or accurately. The first kind of growth we could call "input-led growth" and the second could be called "productivity-led growth."

These two forms of growth in turn refer to two different notions of efficiency: what we could refer to as "allocative" and "adaptive" efficiency. Allocative efficiency is improved when things are moved around in an economy to places where they are more productively employed. Allocative efficiency is essentially a function of the invisible hand of the market. As Adam Smith famously and powerfully argued, the most efficient allocation of resources is achieved where supply and demand are allowed to interact freely. But allocative efficiency also depends on the size of the market. Everything else being equal, the larger the market, the more people are able to specialize on those particular tasks which they are relatively better at performing. The larger the market, the smaller pieces labor can be divided into, and the more extensive the division of labor, the higher the rates of growth.

While acknowledging the validity of Smith's insights, later generations of economists also noticed their limitations. Sooner or later, they pointed out, the productive resources of society would be as well allocated as they ever could be and labor would be divided into its smallest possible units. When this point is reached the factors that go into the process of production — labor, capital and land — would necessarily start to yield declining returns. Most dramatically, Thomas Malthus argued, increases in income will result in more births which in turn will lower the income per capita. Thus, as Karl Marx concluded, once capitalism has exhausted its potential, it has to be replaced by a new and superior system. Even those economists who were less keen on revolutionary action than Marx suspected that the long-term prospects for economic growth were bleak.

What none of these nineteenth century economists sufficiently had considered was the possibility of improvements in productivity. Productivity-led growth takes place through the introduction of new management techniques, through improvements in education and training, or even through social or cultural change. What is taken to be important above all else however are changes in technology. Radically new inventions such as the railroad, electricity, the automobile or the computer constitute technological quantum leaps that move the economy as a whole onto a new growth path. It is the ability of contemporary societies to constantly experience such leaps which has enabled them to avoid the bleak predictions of the nineteenth-century economists. Thanks to continuous improvements in technology we are never running up against the limits of what it is possible to produce.

What is at stake here is not allocative but instead adaptive efficiency. Merely reallocating resources within a market will never make it possible to sustain growth over the long term. What matters instead is whether enough resources are devoted to increasing the productive potential of society. This the market mechanism alone cannot guarantee. The forces of supply and demand may operate with textbook-like ferocity, allowing people to perfectly satisfy their preferences, but a society where this is the case may still grow more slowly than another society in which market forces are less efficient but where resources are more obviously geared towards long-term growth.

If Adam Smith provided the best analysis of how output-led growth takes place, Joseph Schumpeter provided the best analysis of productivity-led growth. According to Schumpeter, economies grow not by following their established paths but instead by breaking with them. Entrepreneurs are the ones who are responsible for these breaks. Entrepreneurs are people who constantly look for new things to sell and new ways in which to sell them. In the process they introduce the kinds of innovations on which the economy ultimately depends for its development. The entrepreneur, says Schumpeter, is the person responsible both for destroying the old and for creating the new.

(Continues...)

Excerpted from Why Europe Was First by Erik Ringmar. Copyright © 2007 Erik Ringmar. Excerpted by permission of Wimbledon Publishing Company.
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Edition details

• Publisher: Anthem Press
• Publication date: 2007
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 1843312417
• ISBN 13: 9781843312413
• Binding: Paperback
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 428