Will the West Fall Like Rome?

How To Academy: "Is the West doomed to be the next Roman Empire? Can we learn something from its fall? Medieval historian Peter Heather thinks we can – and must. What can we learn about the decline of the West from the fall of the Roman Empire? Was decline inevitable for Rome and is it …

US And China Ease Short-Term Tensions, But What About the Long Term?

US President Joe Biden met with Chinese Premier Xi Jinping in San Francisco and eased tensions between the two superpowers -- renewing military communications, agreeing to encourage renewable energy development, and reducing fossil fuel emissions. The occasion was a summit of the 21-member Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) forum, which promotes free trade. XI called the …

Why Did Europe Dominate the World?

Three different theories on how Europeans came to dominate the world between the 1500s and the 1700s through the 20th century are explored in three short videos posted on my Substack. Click.

Honor and Shame in Western and Eastern Cultures Are Handled Differently

One cultural generalization is that Western and Eastern, or Asian. perspectives on honor, shame, guilt, innocence, and fear are different. Westerners tend to believe in transparency, full disclosure, publicly reporting on conflicts, and “telling it like it is,” even if embarrassment is the result. Honesty is a high value in Western cultures. It is the …

Does Western Civilization Actually Exist?

Skepticism grows among historians about whether the traditional frames of teaching world history -- Western Civilization and Eastern Civilization -- actually exist. I explore this trend on Substack: https://jimbuie.substack.com/p/does-western-civilization-actually

War on the West?

'Progressive' comedian Bill Maher defends Western values against perceived assault, especially in the Israel-Palestine conflict. His commentary on “The War on the West” went viral, with as of this writing more 1.2 million views on YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wnl243DjsUE On Substack, I do a deeper dive into the concept that there's a war on Western values, reporting on …

Why Europeans Came to Dominate the World, in 7 Minutes

  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hYSz010CVss Thought Monkey: "Three hundred years ago something big happened. The western world began to look at the world with new scientific eyes. There was a problem with this, though. As scientists began to classify the world into different categories, they also began to divide the human species into sub-species. Because of this an …

Asia Once Ruled the World, and May Do So Again in the 21st Century

World history focusing on the last 500 years tends to be a story of European or Western domination. The conventional wisdom is that Europeans triumphed because they had superior technology, superior institutions, and won the military competition because they were more fit and strategic. But this may have been a temporary exception to the predominant …

Does African History Disprove Jared Diamond’s Theory That Guns, Germs and Steel Explain Western Dominance?

Cynical Historian: "There’s a question in the history profession that if sufficiently answered could not only reshape how we conceive ourselves, but reveal the best course of action for politics around the world. What makes the West strong? While there are many answers, the most popular of these has been Jared Diamond’s "Guns Germs and …

‘Why the West Rules for Now: The Patterns of History and What They Reveal About the Future’

Does the emerging economic power of China and India mean the end of the West's political and cultural dominance of the world, which has endured for more than 200 years? British historian and archaeologist Ian Morris tries to answer this question in his book,  Why the West Rules for Now: The Patterns of History and …