When I was thinking about the conquerors and explorers who came from Western Europe, Scandinavia and the Mediterranean, I had a thought that sparked some curiosity.  Why had these civilizations mastered the abilities of metal working and great ship building that fueled colonialism and imperialism during the 12th - 16th centuries, and those civilizations from the Americas, Africa and India in the same time period had not.  (I don't know if the Asian-Pacific civilizations had the same mastery. I believe they did. Please clear this up) 

Any ideas?  Was it luck, culture, resources, race, geography or other variables? A combination of all?

European civilizations were more capable because of their geography and the culture that extended from it. This began with land in the Northern regions enabling cultivation more effectively than in other areas of the World, and thus allowing its inhabitants to advance more quickly. The age of colonialism was supported by the industrial revolution and accumulation of capital, which encouraged businesses from Europe to expand the economic frontier.

I've been addressing this issue at another forum for quite a while.

Point number one: Diamond's "Germs Guns & Steel" as a thesis does NOT explain why western Europe sought to conquer the planet.  That thesis only purports to explain why they succeeded so easily.

The actual reason for Western European 'exceptionalism' is manifold.  First and foremost, there is a geographic argument that explains why medieval Europe was able to (comparatively) rise vis-a-vis other regions around the word. 

This geographic argument compliments the 'competitive states' argument that suggests the 'hot-house' competitive environment between relatively equal states was what drove European innovation.

Another significant reason for the 'rise of Europe' in the 13th to 16th century is the development of capitalism.

Another significant reason for the 'rise of Europe' in the 13th to 16th century is a complex political argument based upon the effect of the Great Plague (1350's) when 1/3 of Europe's population was eliminated.

These various factors combine to make Europe, "ready, willing and able" to conquer the rest of the planet.

Sidenote: China most certainly had the capability to make long-distance sea voyages circa early 14th century.

No offense but i believe you're a little focused on an imaginary demarcation between the West and Middle Ages+ and the mediterranian and East in Ancient times. We suffered a huge loss of technology, information and wisdom when the Roman empire was torn apart. Colonialism is just the evolution of the 'central-authority' lessons learned from an empire that broke apart. Had we not lost this technology and drifted into a 'dark age',  man might've landed on the moon in the 1500's.

All of these advancements from ship building to metal working (Syria made the best swords besides the Japanese using a similar folding technique and adding carbon each time. This was in 800BC and it rocked but the technique was lost) all came from somewhere else. Built on something else, by someone else. What is ineteresting is the flow of this over history. A constant Westernly bound wave of civilization or technology while the ones who used to own it either moved with them or fell back into obscurity.



Ahk

The idea that the Native American cultures remained primitive and small compared to European powers has something to do with being Communistic in principle doesn't make much sense. Some Indian cultures were communal, and some had a redistributive economy, yes, but it's generally a myth that many of the Native American cultures were communistic. That's a historical inaccuracy. Some were, some were not.

They indeed did have concepts of property ownership as well a class differentiation. The best example of this is in the archaic with the Hohokam culture of the American Southwest. It was a highly advanced culture for its time, as were the later Mississippian's at Cahokia. The problem was that they were so successful in their environment that they did not have selective pressures to change drastically once agriculture developed. They remained relatively sedentary, static, because their lifeway worked. Unlike most of the Native Americans, as well, these cultures became large, encompassing, and advanced because they managed to beat back the other nomadic groups and take control of the river basins, something like what happened in the Fertile Crescent in the Third millennium.

Moreover, many cultures, such as the Pacific Northwest tribes had very little incentive to change because, again, their lifeway worked. In fact, they didn't even develop agriculture until very late because the PN environment provided a bounty that lasted sufficed, so their populations tended to remain very small.

You also have to understand that the Neolithic came very late to N. America, and N. America in general was both settled a lot later than the counterparts in the Old World where civilization began. In the East, civilization began in Mesopotamia and then spread out, which helped build up the later cultures.  The North American had none of that. THey had to start from scratch after migrating after the Ice Age, rather isolated. They were progressing, but at a reduced pace because they were lacking that boost, beginning from scratch, and did not have access to the inventions that permeated Western Asia.

It is not even as if a redistributive system turns them into savage, moronic brutes. This system was used in Mesopotamia for thousands of years when it made it's greatest civilized achievements from the Hassuna of the 5th millennium up through the Akkadian Empire, which also had a resdistributive economy. In fact, the redistributive economy lasted quite a while up in a modified from in the Roman Empire and Hellenistic Kingdoms.

The development of this technology, which spread around the ancient world, combined with close contact between large populations fighting over resources incessantly lead to achievement, and this achievement surged forward with the invention of Science in the 16th-17th century.


The environment, happenstance, and access to the achievements of other cultures, combined with a late, isolated start were great problems for Native Americans. Of the advanced cultures, they were either wiped out by disease (TB and the Mississippians) or collapsed due to drought and ecological shifts. The same thing happened in the third millennium around 2200 B.C. The problem is that when it happened in N. America, the problem was worse.

A well argued point.

But how does this account for Africa and even India and China?  Europeans had remarkable success against them as much as against the North American natives.

Your argument doesn't address the European success in those other parts of the world outside the Americas.

Indeed, the 'late neolithic' argument seems particularly weak given that it was the Africans who were first in that field of endeavor...

If anything, I would think it's because of need. Europe sucked, people needed to get out and see new things.

The Chinese had sailed junks to the coasts of Europe long before, and went home because they didn't find anything worth staying for.



Likewise, it was a sense of dire need that ensured Romes rise to empire. In their case, the need to vanquish Carthage.

Great thread!

I tend to agree with the GGS theories, yet agree almost completely with Fred's impressive post.

I think we are not giving enough credit to the Germs part of Dr Diamond's theory. Mechanically, European germs killed millions of aboriginal people in the New World, and tropical diseases in Sub Saharan Africa and other places halted European influence.
Having been in disease-ridden places in the world, I can attest to the entropic nature of the tropics. People who are full of parasites and have to fight off plagues and crop diseases cannot afford to produce the same number of scientists and philosophers and explorers as a society that is less bothered by pestilence.



 "Now why did it happen in Europe? "

I think we are also underestimating the influence of the Roman Church in the European Renaissance. IMO the Church was so corrupt and inconsistent that it disillusioned a larger and larger number of people into a secular frame of mind. This surfaced as a quest for a more objective way to look at the world and a revival of Classical humanist virtues, ironically made possible and in part sponsored by the Church, the sole repository of Classical texts and the sole sponsor of rigorous thought for 1000 years.