Civilization: The West and the Rest

Ferguson dedicates the first chapter to the differences between China and Europe in the Early Modern period (around 1400-1800 CE). Ferguson argues that while China stagnated, the West surged forward. He sets out to demonstrate the way in which Europe surpassed China and credits this development to the institutional support for competition (one of Ferguson’s “killer apps”). First, the author compares China to Europe by using the Thames and Yangzi rivers. Second, he discusses the Chinese explorer Zheng He before the age of Early Modern European exploration. Third, he focuses on the perceived stagnation of China under the Qing dynasty (1636-1912).

Western visitors, like the famed merchant and traveler Marco Polo, were “impressed by the volume of traffic on the Yangzi” in the late 13th century. Thames, in contrast, was still “a veritable backwater” in the early 15th century. Similarly, the author compares Nanjing to London, which in the early 15th century “was barely a town” (23). Ferguson acknowledges that multiple factors affected development. The Black Plague ravaged Europe between 1346 to 1353 CE and decimated much of its population. Life expectancy in Europe, in general, was low as a result of poor sanitation, childhood mortality, and violence.