University of Chicago Professor William H. McNeill Historian Says 21st-Century Challenges Must Be Viewed From Global Perspective by John Shaw If you were to convene the worldís leading historians and ask them to identify their most influential member, there is a very good chance they would settle relatively quickly on a single name: William H. McNeill. McNeill, a professor of history at the University of Chicago for 40 years, has written seminal books on the rise of the West, the pivotal role that disease has played in history, the complex links between Eastern and Western Europe, the importance of military establishments in advancing technology and innovation, and the role of dance and drill in forging group solidarity. Most recently, he and his son John, a professor at Georgetown University, have co-authored a compelling book titled ìThe Human Web: A Birdís-Eye View of World Historyî that offers an authoritative and provocative overview of world history. The book argues that even far-flung human communities have been connected, albeit sometimes tenuously, over countless centuries. In an interview with The Washington Diplomat, McN eill said that in his research he has tried to look across different civilizationsí boundaries to identify common themes in human history. ìWeíve had a single history. I feel there are moral implications and overtones to that. Instead of being divided up into potentially hostile religious or civilizational blocks, we are one species. There are moral attractions to the globalist angle of vision. I donít feel at all apologetic about the moral implications of my ideas,î he said. Now 86, McNeill is energetic, intellectually curious and passionate about understanding and explaining the past. McNeill has studied the evolution of communities and tried to determine what forces and processes shape history. ìFrom the very beginning, Iíve looked for large-scale patterns,î he said. McNeill believes that webs have drawn humans together in patterns of cooperation and competition for thousands of years. A web, in his view, is a set of connections that link people to one another. In these connections, people communicate information and use that information to guide their future behavior. They also communicate or transfer useful technologies, goods, crops, ideas and, inadvertently, diseases. Whether small or large, loose or dense, these webs have been the channel for the movement of ideas, habits and resources within and across cultures and societies. In McNeillís view, webs of interaction have been a constant over the ages: from the thin, localized webs that characterized agricultural communities 12,000 years ago to the denser, more interactive webs that surrounded ancient Sumer to the electrified web that now envelops the world and sends information and ideas cascading across the planet. ìAlthough people experience it in different ways, today everyone lives inside a single global web, a maelstrom of cooperation and competition,î he said. ìThe career of these webs of communication and interaction constitutes the overarching structure of human history.î McNeill said ìThe Human Webî offers a more incisive and balanced account of the civilizing process than his earlier writings. He considers it a satisfying climax to his efforts at understanding manís life on earth. Born in Vancouver, British Columbia, in 1917, McNeill moved with his family to Chicago in 1927. He received his undergraduate and graduate degrees from the University of Chicago and his doctorate in history from Cornell University in 1947 after having served more than five years in the Army during World War II. He also worked for several years under prominent historian Arnold Toynbee. McNeill has written 30 books, and his work has been translated into Chinese, French, German, Italian, Norwegian and Spanish. He was elected president of the American Historical Association in 1984 and won the prestigious Erasmus Prize in 1996. His signature book, ìThe Rise of the West: A History of the Human Community,î was published in 1963 and became a bestseller in the United States and won the National Book Award in history the next year. Critics lavished praise on McNeillís interpretation of how different societies interacted with one another. The central message of ìThe Rise of the Westî was that since a succession of civilizations achieved primacy in the past only to surrender their place to newcomers, something similar probably lay ahead for the West. ìëThe Rise of the Westí was a remarkable book,î said Stephen Bailey, a history professor at Knox College in Illinois. ìOne could fairly say that a paradigm shift has taken place in the past 40 years. McNeillís book played a key role in that shift in that it portrayed Europe as shaping and being shaped by the rest of the world.î Walter McDougall, a historian at the University of Pennsylvania, said it is difficult to overstate McNeillís accomplishments. ìI used to quip that Professor McNeill must have a twin brotherógiven he mentored a battalion of students, chaired his department, edited a major journal, mastered the history of all ages and civilizations, served his profession in many capacities, yet still seemed to churn out a brilliant new book every year,î McDougall said. ìIíve been blessed with a score of educational privileges, but just to observe McNeillís disciplined, shrewd, imaginative mindóand his magnanimous characterówas the greatest blessing of all.î McNeill is a steadfast champion of the study of world history, arguing that it provides a broader and deeper perspective than that offered by national or regional histories. He helped establish the World History Association and continues to insist that a study of global history is the best way to give students the foundation they need to understand the world. McNeillís book ìWorld Historyî was used for many years by the U.S. Air Force Academy in its history courses. The author believes that historians should play a prominent role in public debates, offering objective facts about the past and also identifying patterns and providing interpretations of what has occurred. McNeill said he is disappointed that the main energies of the historical profession have been consumed by detailed research into narrow, arcane topics that excite little interest from the general publicóor even other historians. The frequent defense for avoiding macro-historical synthesis is the notion that generalization inevitably involves error while accuracy increases with detail. But McNeill said he is concerned that historians, through their fealty to written sources, often wallow in mountains of detail while failing to think about larger patterns that cannot be discovered by immersion in documentary sources. ìHistorians can play a role in changing peopleís minds and providing the basis for public action,î he said. ìHistory is a very noble calling. It is a privilege to try to tell other people, based on our reading and reflection and thought, what is going on around them on matters that are most important in the world.î McNeill is critical of the prevailing belief in the United States that this country is a chosen society that is divinely protected from the forces of history. ìRonald Reagan and now George W. Bush are clear examples of harkening back to a simpler world in which it is the Manifest Destiny of the United States to tell the rest of the world they should become like us,î he said. ìIíve always been a little impervious to the standard version of American patriotic history and even distrustful of it.î An alternative world view that sees the United States as a powerful nation that is part of a community of nations makes far more sense to McNeill. ìWe are part of a single human adventure on earth of the most extraordinary character. No one political structure can claim a monopoly of wisdom, understanding or truth. We ought to be aware of that all the time,î he said. Looking at the world at the dawn of the 21st century, McNeill sees stunning accomplishments, but also difficult challenges that will require global ingenuity, cooperation and humility. ìThere are enormous uncertainties and instabilities in our society. They are not all material shortages, but the most obvious shortages that are likely to manifest themselves are oil and fresh water,î he said. ìThe pace of the exploitation of the environment we have recently attained is perhaps not sustainable. That is, weíre taking out fossil fuels at an enormous rate, and it may not be possible to find new fields. There are few places that are promising for major new oil discoveries that havenít been tapped. I think a century is a pretty optimistic view of what our current rate of consumption can sustain.î McNeill said it i s difficult to fully grasp the challenges posed by the destruction of primary communities across the world. ìIím struck by the decay of village life, which was the cradle of humankind from the time of the Neolithic transformation, the beginning of agriculture, to say 1950. The majority of the population lived in a village. That is not true anymore,î he said. ìWithout this village or primary community identity, the ongoing continuity of human life is very much in question. I donít think human life is sustainable on a long-range basis without primary communities. The challenge is how to find primary communities that get along with one another and are also satisfying to the participants in these communities.î Demographic trends deserve more intense analysis than theyíve been given so far, McNeill noted. ìIím very surprised there is not more discussion in our public life of the demographic decay of the urbanized world. The transformation since 1950 is absolutely spectacular. Population growth has ceased in the big cities of the world, even the Third World. What keeps cities growing is migration from the countryside. But you canít keep emptying out the countryside forever,î he said. ìWe donít know what will happen if we all live to be 100,î he added. ìAnd the transformation of a society from a time in which children under 15 were a majority to a time in which children under 15 [is] a rarity [that] is yet to be endured.î Still vigorous and active, McNeill enjoys gardening for several hours a day, tending to 30 acres in Connecticut. He has just completed an intriguing memoir about his intellectual career, and he continues to write book reviews for prestigious publications such as the New York Review of Books. He is also editing a world history encyclopedia, contributing a chapter on ancient Greece to the publication. McNeill said he has no further ambitions to write a comprehensive history book, adding that ìThe Human Web,î his final major book, co-authored with his son, aptly summarizes his ideas. But he enjoys trying to put the past into careful perspective and challenging students, teachers and policymakers to think more rigorously about the future. ìIf the idea of ëThe Human Webí has any taking power, if it [is] ever spread, it would have the effect of mollifying local conflicts. That is one of the goals a historian should aspire to: to offer ideas that tend to conduce to survival,î McNeill said. ìWe are never going to give up the human penchant for quarrelling. How to modulate our quarrelling without knocking everyone out with hydrogen bombs is the issue of the next century. How to restrain from mutual slaughter is a perennial question. Understanding the other personís point of view is likely to diminish the naÔve impulse we have to impose our interests on others.î John Shaw is a contributing writer for The Washington Diplomat.