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Conquests And Cultures: An International History | 
 enlarge | Author: Thomas Sowell
Publisher: Basic Books
Category: Book
List Price: $21.00
Buy Used: $2.25
You Save: $18.75 (89%)
New (23) Used (28) from $2.25
Avg. Customer Rating:  26 reviews
Sales Rank: 308992
Media: Paperback
Number Of Items: 1
Pages: 516
Shipping Weight (lbs): 1.1
Dimensions (in): 7.9 x 5 x 1.2
ISBN: 0465014003
Dewey Decimal Number: 325.32
EAN: 9780465014002
ASIN: 0465014003
Publication Date: April 29, 1999
Availability: Usually ships in 1-2 business days
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Amazon.com Review
Another tour de force by one of America's leading public intellectuals. Conquests and Cultures continues in the tradition of Sowell's superb books, Race and Culture and Migrations and Cultures. The series attempts to understand the meaning of cultural differences, including how these differences have influenced the economic and social fates of civilizations, nations, and ethnic groups. This particular installment focuses on how military conquest both destroys culture and spreads it by examining the histories of the English, the Africans, the Slavs, and the indigenous people of the New World. Sowell rejects the cultural relativism that is currently so fashionable in the universities and forthrightly believes that some cultures--understood as "the working machinery of everyday life"--are clearly superior to others. He marshals a massive amount of scholarly material to support his ideas, and capably turns this mountain of data into straightforward prose. --John J.Miller
Product Description
This book is the culmination of 15 years of research and travels that have taken the author completely around the world twice, as well as on other travels in the Mediterranean, the Baltic, and around the Pacific rim. Its purpose has been to try to understand the role of cultural differences within nations and between nations, today and over centuries of history, in shaping the economic and social fates of peoples and of whole civilizations. Focusing on four major cultural areas(that of the British, the Africans (including the African diaspora), the Slavs of Eastern Europe, and the indigenous peoples of the Western Hemisphere—Conquests and Cultures reveals patterns that encompass not only these peoples but others and help explain the role of cultural evolution in economic, social, and political development.
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| Customer Reviews: Read 21 more reviews...
 Encyclopedic in scope, but what's the point of it? December 26, 2007
1 out of 1 found this review helpful
I love thomas Sowell's books. Whatever he tells he tells it fascinatingly, if he mentions it it's because its relevant, it's something to make you think, and what is more important in a writer: he makes you look at things from a new perspective. Not here, though. This book is huge in scope but... what the point? He tells us, in parallel, the devolpment of different cultures and civilizations of the world, to compare them. But comparison alone doesn't do the trick when you have to go through so much data and so many pages. I felt tempted to skip the whole thing and go to the conclusion, but even here it is not a conclusion... it's a summary of it all.
I don't want to discourage readers, though, because Mr sowell is one of the finest thinkers in the planet. He's got his feet on the ground as a true great conservative man he is.
Big-picture history January 16, 2007
2 out of 3 found this review helpful
CaC is a series of case-studies looking at the interplay between (as the title indicates) conquest and cultural evolution. I enjoy "big-picture" history but, because the author tries to cover so many examples, the analysis seems to be just a touch shallow. Of course, CaC was probably intended as an overview to demonstrate a larger dynamic.
The most interesting section is the discussion of African slavery. I hadn't realized what a relatively small part the European powers played in the over-all slave-trade. I thought the treatment was fair--neither Euro-bashing nor revisionist.
The other topics were a little more familiar and not quite as interesting. (As I mentioned, the treatment not especially thorough. I flipped through a few parts.) Overall, CaC is pretty good--not great--but worth the time to read for the novice or amateur historian (especially if you're not familiar with the "Annales" school of history to which Sowell is obviously indebted).
 several topics in one book December 7, 2006
3 out of 4 found this review helpful
This book has several threads that interact.
One is that the geography of a country has a strong effect on its history. The western hemisphere did not have beasts of burden until Europeans arrived and therefore stayed in a primitive culture. England had iron ore near coal and both near the seacoast which provided cheap transportation.
Another thread is that some cultures learn from contact with other cultures and some do not. Scotland was invaded by England and when the English left Scotland outclassed the English in engineering and medicine even thought they were behind in the beginning. Earlier the Romans invaded England and improved conditions. When the Romans left the English retrograded for centuries.
Another thread is that human nature is the same all over the earth. All nations have dominated other nations and mistreated them.
Conquests and Cultures March 18, 2006
4 out of 6 found this review helpful
This book demonstrates quite clearly the growth and economic betterment of the people in underdeveloped countries through assistance from the Western Hemisphere world. The legacies of education, nutrition and economic growth and exchange of cultural knowledge brought about even by conquering armies is quite a surprise.
I especially liked the contrast between the desperate situation of the Irish during the various famines and wars with the English as compared to the relative security of the black population in the Southern United States during the periodof slavery.
The book makes a strong statement for the value of sharing technologies and opportunities between and amongst countries for their own betterment rather than merely rapiing the land of the conquered to satisfy the conquerer.
Stings have no venom. April 8, 2004
26 out of 36 found this review helpful
Despite their best efforts, those who reviewed this book negatively or dismissed it as "been there, done that" expose that either their own preconceived notions ran afoul with Sowell's book. Or, their sacred cows were stripped down to expose the cheap hamburger of ideas.
As usual Sowell writes another well-crafted, researched, and documented book. He makes NO conclusions but rather, lets his reader form their own conclusions.
As evidenced by the fact that none of the so called "Politically Incorrect" panel shows NEVER invited Sowell on because no one on the left can counter Sowell's ease of analysis and myth-shattering and that includes lofty lefties like Hitchens, Chomsky, Schlesinger, and Cockburn...so goes the list of those who rail at the idea of a free-thinking minority having the audacity to stray from the Liberal Plantation (Not that Sowell was ever on the plantation in the first place).A good measured read with plenty to challenge the reader (who doesn't wear idealogical blinders). A good book to add to your library.
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