Jared Diamond’s main point in his
article “Why Did
Human History Unfold Differently On Different Continents For The Last 13,000
Years?” is essentially that the differences in the success of different
societies is based on geographic factors instead of biological factors. From
this main essential point, Diamond begins to expand on why this is the case by
comparing the success of Eurasian societies to Native American societies,
Sub-Saharan African societies, and Aboriginal Australian societies. The three
later societies have been conquered by Eurasian societies due to factors such
as: stronger immunity to germs, better weapons, and a more organized and
complex society structure. Diamond goes into some detail to explain why each of
these factors gave Eurasian societies an advantage and how these factors
occurred.
Diamond starts out by talking about
the European colonization of America. The Europeans were severely outnumbered,
but even so, they were able to conquer the millions of Native Americans that
previously lived there. The same thing occurred in Sub-Saharan African and
Australia. In this article, he states that this was due primarily to the germs
that were infecting and even killing up to 95% of the population in the case of
the Native Americans. Increased weaponry and domesticated animals used for
battle also had a great affect and made it so that they didn’t have a chance
regardless of their greater numbers and fighting on their native lands. He then
asks us the question: “Why were Eurasians the one’s to have this increased
immunity, more advanced weapons, etc.?”
Diamond makes it clear that the time that a society
has been around does not contribute to the societies success and that there is
no difference in biological make-up which leads to only one clear answer,
geography. One’s geographical features such as North to South axis vs East to
West axis, proximity to other societies, fertile land, and domestic plants and
animals all contribute to a society’s success.
In the case of America and Sub-Saharan Africa, he
states that the main problems were a larger North to South axis vs the larger
East to West axis found in Eurasia. The axis difference made it so that there
were different climates throughout America and Africa, inhibiting the use of
uniform domestic crops and livestock throughout the entire region. This makes
it harder for agriculture, which is the main foundation for the growth and
success of a society since it enables a more efficient society that has a governing
body and specialized jobs that allows for more time to create goods and weapons
since they do not need spend time and energy focusing on catching food as
opposed to hunting and gathering.
Also, the number of domesticated plants and animals
is a very important advantage that Eurasia had over the other regions. With
more domesticated plants and animals, not only could a society support more
people, but it also helped them build immunity against many diseases that
originated from livestock, which resulted in the death of millions of Native Americans,
Sub-Saharan Africans, and Aboriginal Australians. This was a huge advantage that the Eurasians
had that was possible due to their similar climate throughout the region, which
made the uniformity of domesticated plants and animals very easy and possible.
The last factor of success, which inhibited the
Aboriginal Australians the most, was proximity to other societies. Diamond
makes it clear that proximity to other societies allows for the creation and
retention of ideas, which help advance a society. For Australians especially,
they were on a continent that was far away from many others making their
progress much slower since they could not communicated and transfer ideas with
other societies. This was not the case for Eurasian societies since they were
all part of one big landmass and therefore ideas spread rapidly resulting in
the faster development of new and more efficient technology.
These ideas can be applied to today’s global economy
because countries with access to natural resources, a good agriculture system,
and a strong military seem to be the most successful and have Eurasian
origins/influences. These countries tend to have a more organized and stable
government with more specializations which in turn leads to a more efficient
society overall. Also, countries that work together and share ideas, especially
with the use of the Internet, seem to have an advantage over those who do not
communicate as frequently. This just comes to show that each one of these
factors is essential and contributes to a society’s success regardless of
whether it was 1000 years ago or today.
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