Simon & Schuster The Clash of Civilizations and the Remaking of World Order

Lo pedí en inglés porque me hacía falta para un trabajo relacionado con el tema. Es fácil de entender, está todo bastante bien explicado. Incluye imágenes y gráficas. La letra es más bien pequeña.

The author, a political scientist at Harvard University, argues that the central feature of post-Cold War international relations will be conflicts among "civilizations". Civilizations, according to the author, are cultural identities that are typically larger than ethnic or racial groups. Frequently, civilizations are synonymous with major religions. The author sets forth seven major civilizations, and is open to the possibility of nine civilizations: (1) Japanese, (2) Sino-Confucian, (3) Hindu-Indian, (4) Buddhist (which goes virtually undiscussed in the book), (5) Islamic, (6) Orthodox (centered around Russia), (7) Western (Catholic and Protestant), plus the more uncertain (8) Latin American (which may be, or may become, a sub-type of Western civilization) and (9) African (which may become centered around South Africa).I find the author's thesis unconvincing for three reasons. First, nation-states remain the locus of international relations, and accordingly I find realism the most explanatory of international relations theories. At times, the author appears to acknowledge this: Orthodox Georgia has tense relations with Orthodox Russia, Confucian Vietnam has tense relations with Confucian China, Western Australia is contemplating pivoting to Confucian China, and Latin American Mexico is contemplating pivoting to Western United States. None of these situations are explained by civilizations theory, but all are explained by realism.Second, when it comes to culture, ethnicity matters more civilization. Western Czechs and Western Slovaks split into separate nations, Orthodox Ukrainians fight to the death to be independent from Orthodox Russians, Islamic Punjabis slaughter Islamic Bengalis, and Islamic Arabs and Islamic Turks bomb Islamic Kurdish villages.And third, at least within the West, education / intelligence is an increasing divisive factor even within nations and ethnic groups. As of the mid-2020s, politics in many Western countries consists of a left-wing party, supported by white cognitive elites and non-whites, and a right-wing party, supported by whites with less cognitive ability. And in the Western societies that are better at assimilating immigrants -- in particular, the UK and the USA -- even non-whites have begun to split along cognitive lines.

While I'm still in the EARLY GOING of this book, it did not take long, almost literally by 1st and second page, i realized this was NOT going to be one of my bedtime readings. INTENSE. Profound. NOT a mindless easy read. It feels and reads as if every word is exacting {perhaps not my best words choice} and even hard for my intellect to describe. Every single sentence speaks VOLUMES in itself and could create its own dissertation or Thesis study. THATS what i mean by 'intense'. SO much so its difficult to really just enjoy without having or creating DEEP thought..which again is when i realized this was not meant to put anyone's mind to rest or bedtime story reading. And I'm ONLY 58 pages into it, this far! ALSO..if ur like me, not as young as once was, ALSO found myself bumping up an extra magnification on the 'readers'. What may appear on the surface to be only a 350-page book or so, is MORE like a 700-pager with essentially half-size 'normal' print.You're getting your monies worth in just sheer volume, alone. THIS book will ALSO be one of 'THOSE" books will will surely be reading 'again' or 'over' a few times... bc its simply SO involved, you are guaranteed to miss something along the way. I ORIG got this text , as i generally do, when referenced in another text. SO thot I'd check it out. NO way I'd ever be able to read it on simple library loan.

Interesting

It is over 10 years since I read Samuel Huntington's full length expansion of his classic Foreign Affairs article. This was read during my final year at university, and back then, it was fashionable amongst many to refute, or outrightly mock Professor Huntington's disturbing piece of work. The work was derided amongst my fellow students, it was frequently derieded amongst academia, it is something of a fashion statement to deride Huntington's work. Why?Could it be, perhaps, because of a deep, inbuilt feeling that we just know that he was right?In the 10+ years since I read this monumental study, I have encountered very little in current events to refute his argument. Time has vindicated Huntington, and will continue to vindicate him.Huntington identifies 9 civilizations, Western, Orthodox, Islamic, Latin American, African, Sinic, Hindu, Buddhist and Japanese.The 2 civilizations that Huntington considers to be the most potentially antagonistic toward the West are Islamic and Sinic, however, as this book was completed in 2006, various conflicts had not yet played out between the West and the Orthodox World, and this is deserving of a special place as a potential faultline civilization.Huntington considers the value systems of Sinic and Islamic culture as essentially incompatible with the West, and attempts to assimilate or reconcile Western values with these cultures is ultimately futile. Therefore, Huntington advocates a careful, cautious approach to foreign policy, wherein Western powers should try to mediate civilizational disputes, but not directly involve themselves with them.Why do I think Huntington has been vindicated? The list is not exhaustive.Firstly, attempts through that ill conceived 2003-? War in Iraq to democracize Iraq has proved a colossal failure. The Arab Spring led to an outright dead end for all countries involved except Tunisia, and Turkish membership of the EU remains a pipe dream.However, while Huntington's work was written before the full democratization of South Korea and Taiwan, we have seen little progress in China toward any kind of accountable or open system, and China has recently given Hong Kong a half-baked, managed democracy.If anything, the civilizational faultline that has become more pronounced is the Orthodox World. Russia and US relations are at the worst they have ever been since the end of the Cold War, and the continuing support of Putin's strongman leadership amongst the Russian population shows a general preference in Russia at least for strongman leadership, rather than a more pluralistic approach.The situation in Ukraine is perhaps the Western-Orthodox divide being played out within a single, fragmented state, and is in many ways the result of naive Western attempts to push Western Institutions (NATO and the EU) into the Orthodox World.A further example was the almost universal Western support (exception Spain) for the unilateral independence of Kosovo, and then the complete reverse of this foreign policy toward the Russian unification with Crimea.This is not to distract oneself with current issues. Huntington's original work was written in response to the 1991 Gulf War, and the expanded book was based on events in the 90s, such as the Yugoslav wars, Chechnya, and the very nature of Sino-Western relations.However, very little has transpired to prove Huntington wrong, and few would argue that his main policy proscription, that the West only mediate, not directly involve themselves with disputes involving other civilizations.I think the dust will never settle on the debate over Huntington's thesis, but Huntington has convinced this reader at least.