How the West Won - Rodney Stark (2014).pdf

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HOW THE WEST
WON
The Neglected Story of
the Triumph of Modernity
Rodney Stark
Wilmington, Delaware
Contents
Introduction
What You
Don’t
Know about the Rise of the West
Part I Classical Beginnings (500 BC–AD 500)
1
Stagnant Empires and the Greek “Miracle”
2
Jerusalem’s Rational God
3
The Roman Interlude
Part II The Not-So-Dark Ages (500–1200)
4
The Blessings of Disunity
5
Northern Lights over Christendom
6
Freedom and Capitalism
Part III Medieval Transformations (1200–1500)
7
Climate, Plague, and Social Change
8
The Pursuit of Knowledge
9
Industry, Trade, and Technology
10
Discovering the World
Part IV The Dawn of Modernity (1500–1750)
11
New World Conquests and Colonies
12
The Golden Empire
13
The Lutheran Reformation: Myths and Realities
14
Exposing Muslim Illusions
15
Science Comes of Age
Part V Modernity (1750– )
16
The Industrial Revolution
17
Liberty and Prosperity
18
Globalization and Colonialism
Notes
Bibliography
Index
Introduction
What You
Don’t
Know about the Rise of the
West
T
his is a remarkably unfashionable book.
Forty years ago the most important and popular freshman course
at the best American colleges and universities was “Western
Civilization.” It not only covered the general history of the West but
also included historical surveys of art, music, literature, philosophy,
and science. But this course has long since disappeared from most
college catalogues on grounds that Western civilization is but one of
many civilizations and it is ethnocentric and arrogant for us to study
ours.1
It is widely claimed that to offer a course in “Western
Civilization” is to become an apologist “for Western hegemony and
oppression” (as the classicist Bruce Thornton aptly put it).2 Thus,
Stanford dropped its widely admired “Western Civilization” course just
months after the Reverend Jesse Jackson came on campus and led
members of the Black Student Union in chants of “Hey-hey, ho-ho,

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