Civilization: The West And The Rest

Product Description

In 1412, Europe was a miserable backwater ravaged by plague, bad sanitation and incessant war, while the Orient was home to dazzling civilizations. Yet, somehow, the West came to dominate the Rest for most of the next half millennium.

In this vital, brilliant book, Niall Ferguson reveals the six 'killer applications' that the Rest lacked- competition, science, property rights, medicine, consumerism and the work ethic. And he asks- do we still have these winning tools? Or is this the end of Western ascendancy?

Winner of the Estoril Global Issues Distinguished Book Prize 2013In 1412, Europe was a miserable backwater ravaged by plague, bad sanitation and incessant war, while the Orient was home to dazzling civilizations. Yet, somehow, the West came to dominate the Rest for most of the next half millennium.

In this vital, brilliant book, Niall Ferguson reveals the six 'killer applications' that the Rest lacked- competition, science, property rights, medicine, consumerism and the work ethic. And he asks- do we still have these winning tools? Or is this the end of Western ascendancy?

Winner of the Estoril Global Issues Distinguished Book Prize 2013
Niall Ferguson is one of Britain's most renowned historians. He is the Laurence A. Tisch Professor of History at Harvard University, a Senior Fellow of the Hoover Institution, Stanford University, and a Visiting Professor at Tsinghua University, Beijing. He has written fourteen books, including The House of Rothschild, Empire, The War of the World, The Ascent of Money, The Great Degeneration and Kissinger, 1923-1968- The Idealist. His many prizes include the Benjamin Franklin Prize for Public Service (2010), the Hayek Prize for Lifetime Achievement (2012) and the Ludwig Erhard Prize for Economic Journalism (2013).