To Govern the Globe: World Orders and Catastrophic Change

by Alfred W. McCoy

In a tempestuous narrative that sweeps across five continents and seven centuries, this book explains how a succession of catastrophes—from the devastating Black Death of 1350 through the coming climate crisis of 2050—has produced a relentless succession of rising empires and fading world orders. During the long centuries of Iberian and British imperial rule, the quest for new forms of energy led to the development of the colonial sugar plantation as a uniquely profitable kind of commerce. In a time when issues of race and social justice have arisen with pressing urgency, the book explains how the plantation’s extraordinary profitability relied on a production system that literally worked the slaves to death, creating an insatiable appetite for new captives that made the African slave trade a central feature of modern capitalism for over four centuries. After surveying past centuries roiled by imperial wars, national revolutions, and the struggle for human rights, the closing chapters use those hard-won insights to peer through the present and into the future.  By rendering often-opaque environmental science in lucid prose, the book explains how climate change and changing world orders will shape the life opportunities for younger generations, born at the start of this century, during the coming decades that will serve as the signposts of their lives—2030, 2050, 2070, and beyond.

Genres: History, Politics, Nonfiction, International Relations

623 pages, Kindle Edition

Published November 16, 2021

About the author

Dr Alfred W. McCoy is professor of SE Asian History at the U. of Wisconsin at Madison where he also serves as director of the Center for SE Asian Studies, a federally-funded National Resource Center. He's spent the past quarter-century writing about the politics & history of the opium trade. In addition to publications, he serves as a correspondent for the Observatoire Geopolitique des Drogues in Paris & was plenary speaker at their '92 conference in Paris sponsored by the European Community. In '93, he presented a paper on the Mafia & the Asian heroin trade at the Conference in Honor of Giovanni Falcone in Palermo, Sicily. In 3/96, he was the plenary speaker at the 7th International Conference on Drug Harm Reduction in Hobart, Australia. He's served as expert witness & consultant to the Canadian Commission of Inquiry into the Non-Medical use of Drugs, the Australian Royal Commission of Inquiry into Drugs, the Minister of Administrative Services, Victoria State Parliament, & the Deputy Assistant Secretary of Defense for Drug Enforcement Policy & Support in the Office of the US Secretary of Defense. Recently, he worked as consultant & commentator for a tv documentary on the global heroin traffic produced by the Australian Broadcasting Corporation, accompanying the crew to locations in Burma, Thailand, Vietnam & Laos.

Reviews

[Reading · Rating 5 out of 5]

Mr. McCoy has outdone his previous books with this masterful, compelling and exceptional overview of empire and world... order.

The reader is provided a summation of the major geopolitical influences, technological innovations and consequences of previous empires, with an emphasis on domination and control of resources & populations, transport advances & areas of control, and broad governance choices. No doubt a fair amount of detail is left out BUT this is by necessity so that the reader can be provided a historical overview from which to examine our present circumstances and understand potential future trends.

Noticeably absent from the survey is any sort of bias or judgement and sparse offers of remedies. While I absolutely appreciate this it did contribute to leaving me a bit less than inspired that humanity will... make it, at least in any recognizable form of social organization. But that's OK - OK not that we might not make it, though on a purely philosophical level I'm OK with that. What I mean by OK is that the author leaves it to the reader to look elsewhere for answers on how to confront the crisis or determine... blame and instead the book focuses on providing context and broad lessons to reflect on. This choice to present the material dispassionately, and I do believe he succeeds, insures that this book is accessable to a wider audience. You can recommend this to your Trump loving, QAnon believing cousin or your Antifa, black block supporting niece and both will find common ground.

Alas, in addition to feeling incredibly empowered by the knowledge gained from reading this book, upon completion I also felt a strong desire to shout Private First Class William L. Hudson's iconic line from Aliens - "Game over man!".

And yet I hope that you will read it and like me, be motivated, nay inspired to use the information you glean to seek out proposals and policies to bring about change and join others to prevent 'game over' or at least insure that the rules of said game change for the betterment of all. Let's build a better world on the common ground/knowledge of the mistakes that got us here but nurtured by the roots of what draws us together in need - livable environment, safe shelter and community purpose.

[Rick Goff · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book takes as its subject not empires but world orders,beginning with the Iberian Age, proceeding to the British Age, the American Age, likely the Chinese Age, and finally the post-Chinese Age. Each of these Ages is characterized by its positions on national sovereignty and human rights. So this is a history of social relations, economic relations, geopolitical strategy, military innovation, and natural disaster. Transitions from one world order to the next proceed from catastrophe, from the Black Death to the Napoleonic Wars to World War II. In the closing chapter McCoy argues that a future world order with any hope of managing the advance of climate catastrophe and its effects on the human population must take some form of global governance, diminishing the long exalted principle of national sovereignty.

It’s history on a grand scale, presented with enough clarity and evidence to make it accessible to any reader with an interest in history.

[Mazen · Rating 4 out of 5]

علي الرغم المركزية الأوروبية التي ينطلق منها الكتاب بمحاولته تصوير أن تاريخ العالم كله مجرد هوامش موجودة في صفحات مغامرات الأوروبيين، إلا أن الكاتب يشرح بنوع من الاستفاضة كيف تكونت ثلاث من النظم العالمية غطت قارات الكوكب أجمع بنظام شبه الجزيرة شبه الجزيرة الإيبيرية، ثم النظام العالمي البريطاني، ثم الأميركي الذي نعيش مراحل أفوله، يبدأ الكتاب بسرد مفهوم النظام العالمي و كيف لإمبراطورية أن تقوم بحفظ الأمن و تزيد من تراكم ثروات الإمبراطورية و كيف تم هذا عبر التحكم بالبحار و المضايق البحرية الضيقة و ما هي أبرز تحديات هذه النظم. سرد الكاتب بزوغ فكرة العبودية و كيف أن الكنسية الكاثوليكية ساهمت بنوع من التشجيع علي الابادات الجماعية و الرق لشعوب الأمريكيتين، و السود من أفريقيا، و دور بريطانيا الاستثنائي بعد اكتشاف طاقة الفخم و البخار في القضاء علي تِلك التجارة البشعة. مَر الكتاب علي تحديات تواجه امريكا حالياً من الصين بسبب بزوغ اقتصادها العملاق بشكل أسي محيّر و مواجهة امريكا في بحرها الجنوبي و قدرتها علي تشكيل قوات بحرية حقيقية ممكن أن تحيد انتشار امريكا في المحيط الهادئ، و عن أزمة المناخ التي طالت الكوكب كله بسبب السعار الرأسمالي الاستهلاكي القائم علي الربح الذي حول الأرض لساونا عملاقة ممكن أن تمحي اشكال عملاقة من الحياة في ظرف 50 سنة.

[Rajiv Chopra · Rating 5 out of 5]

Alfred McCoy's book. "To Govern the Globe" is a magnificent book. To cover the rise and fall of the great empires, to write about their interrelationships, the cause of their rise and fall, and to create an engrossing narrative is a cause for celebration.
He started with the changes in Europe after the Black Death and the invasions of Genghis Khan and Tamerlane. These events forced changes on Europeans and forced them to go out in search of income. Thus started the age of global trade, empire, colonialism, and genocide.

We are in a state of flux. America is plateauing, if not declining; China is rising, and climate change is creating its own challenges.

Alfred McCoy's analyses of the past empires, America, China, and the forces shaking the world now, are impeccable.
On top, the book is readable.

[Jessica Zu · Rating 4 out of 5]

still quite eurocentric, top-down solution kinda thing. but the information is so rich.

[Sugarpunksattack Mick · Rating 2 out of 5]

Alfred W. McCoy is a brilliant thinker and has had an incredible career exposing US malfeasance, however, his book 'To Govern the Globe: World Orders and Catastrophic Change' unfortunately fails short of his normal contribution. McCoy sets out to outline the three global orders--the Iberian, the British, the US age--that ruled in their time and to warn about the emerging (possible) fourth global order ruled by China and the environmental cataclysm. McCoy's narrative tracing the long history and rise and fall of the first two global orders of the Iberian age and the British age is absolutely worth reading and is the lion share of the book. What I find strange is that he provides a good overview of these global orders as a historical narrative, but his critical framework--which he barely mentions or employs--appears to be only half thought out. The section on the US as a global empire was very short, but I also think it was sufficient for most readers who have a cursory understanding of US history. Likewise, I expected the brevity of the section on the US empire was to give ample space to an explaining how China may emerge as the fourth global empire or how climate catastrophe may stop us all. Regrettably, McCoy does little more than tease us with how China is rising and what he predicts.

[مهند mohaned · Rating 4 out of 5]

كتاب قيم يختصر تاريخ نهوض وسقوط الامبراطوريات في العصر الحديث…لم أقرأ كتابًا مترجمًا في حياتي بمثل تلك الترجمة السيئة جدا وهي علامة مميزة لتلك الدار اللبنانية السيئة المسماة الدار العربية للعلوم ناشرون! فلا يخلو سطر من خطأ ما في الترجمة او الطباعة او اللغة بل من المحتمل استخدام تطبيق للترجمة بدون ادنى مراجعة!.
قرأت كتبا سابقة صادرة عن تلك الدار السيئة الصيت ! وقد ارسلت رسائل الكترونية للتنبيه على تلك الاخطاء الكارثية ولكنهم في احدى المرات كان ردهم غير مقنع وحملوا المترجم او المؤلف المسؤولية!.
يحتاج القارئ لهذا الكتاب وبتلك الترجمة السيئة جدا الى معرفة كاملة بالتاريخ وبالاسماء والاماكن سواء باللغة الانكليزية او العربية وعليه من لا يملك تلك المقدرة سوف يواجه صعوبة بالغة في القراءة!.
لا ادري لماذا لا تقوم الحكومات العربية الفاسدة والمتخلفة في معاقبة دور النشر على السرقات او الطباعة الرديئة بمنع دخول نتاجها الى بلادهم المقهورة!.

[Jeff Carpenter · Rating 5 out of 5]

Brilliant. This should be taught in every senior High School class. In the world.

The book analyzes successive world orders, and establishes the timelines, up through the British Empire, then the American-led hegemony, and now it’s eclipse by what he sees will be run by the Chinese. But even in that eclipse, America will try to keep asserting its former position of sole super-power, and that’s where things can go off the rails.

In his final analysis, the Climate Crisis will change the game so that only a true unity of world powers will be able to take control.

If we can survive that long. (my opinion)

[Dick Vodra · Rating 3 out of 5]

I learned a lot in the first parts of this book, but was disappointed in his two concluding (forecasting) chapters. The author provides an interesting overview of how the world has been organized over the last 600 years. The Iberian Age was one of "finders keepers" between Spain and Portugal after the Pope divided the world between them and declared that slavery was good and proper, leading to exploitation of native and African populations to mine precious metals and grow sugar. Later on, the Brits and the Dutch got in on the deal, with much of the focus staying on sugar and trading posts.

After Napoleon's fall left Britain as the only power standing, they got to run the world from 1815 to 1945, abolishing the slave trade, helping the Latin Americans become independent, and eventually helping change the governance of Africa from trading posts to colonies (along with the Germans, the French, Portuguese, Italians, Spanish, and Belgians), settling Canada, Australia, New Zealand, running India and various other parts of the world. This was powered by using most of the world's coal to power industry, build ships, have a good currency, and a plan.

The American turn came in 1945. This was a world with the UN, and colonialism was replaced at least formally with lots of independent countries that had not been well-prepared by their former masters. Through our dominant currency, control of the oil/energy system, eventual dominance of the USSR, and free use of the CIA to overthrow or control governments we didn't like, it worked well until the decline of the last decade set in. It was interesting to learn why the US acquired various islands in the Pacific when we did, stories left out of our history books.

The book fails for me when he starts describing the next "world order" that will be based on China, with its Belt and Road Initiative and military control of the South China Sea. I don't see how a nation will prevail when its daughters don't want to have babies, when its wealthy try to get their money and families out of the country, when the cultural strengths used by the UK and then the US are absent (fewer global brands or entertainment exports than South Korea, for example), and when the country is already drowning in debt.

The last chapter is on the climate change threat. Here I think he greatly underestimates both the speed and impact of those changes. He further thinks that governments can solve the emissions problem when the emissions are the product of consumer consumption and global corporate decisions (not just by energy companies). What's worse is overlooking that climate change is not the problem, but merely a symptom of the bigger problem of Overshoot, where we are also killing the oceans, draining the aquifers, destroying soils and biodiversity, and generally demanding more of the planet's resources that it can provide and remain healthy. Impacts that he thinks will happen in 50 years are likely to be here in 10 to 20, or sooner. He relies on official (and conservative) IPCC reports. He fails to ask how nations, communities, and people are likely to respond when the rains fail or flood, when the cities become unlivable, and when migration is simultaneously necessary and made impossible.

Maybe the time for "world orders" will end in the face of "catastrophic change."

[J Earl · Rating 4 out of 5]

One of the difficulties in writing, and thus reading, a book that has to make some generalizations to make the broader point is that small and usually minor omissions or glosses can be brought up. These don't so much counter the larger argument but sidesteps it by making it seem as though everything wasn't properly considered. I, and many reviewers I saw, can find small things that aren't in the book. Any book that covered everything would be unwieldy at best. The key then is to consider whether the larger argument is made without presenting falsehoods (which are different from opinions that happen to differ from your own) or ignoring major areas that would completely disrupt the argument. I think McCoy succeeds in doing this.

While he did give less space to the US and China world orders I'm not sure he gave them as much short shrift as others do. Many of the points are alluded to because the argument about their use was developed earlier in the book. I can remember the early chapters and would prefer not to read a complete rehash of the same ideas repeatedly.

Perhaps where there will be the most disconnect with readers will be where McCoy may be optimistic/pessimistic or positive/negative about the various orders. Not that he doesn't support his position but because the reader may feel different about several of these instances. And we may be tempted to claim he didn't think things through rather than accept that he may have given us some uncomfortable ideas to consider. Will he change our minds? Perhaps. But reassessing our own ideas is always better than immediately claiming the other person didn't think things through.

Future world orders, frankly, may not be long-lived for the simple reason the world, the dry land, may not be as we know it much longer.

Reviewed from a copy made available by the publisher via Edelweiss.

[Gabriel Salgado · Rating 4 out of 5]

La elaboración de una narrativa histórica que cubra 5 siglos es, evidentemente, un proyecto pretensioso. Naturalmente, hay elementos y dinámicas que el autor deja afuera para priorizar las que él considera indivdualmente más importantes, y presenta argumentos para fundamentar su importancia.
Algunos capítulos son menos exitosos que otros en mostrar la línea histórica que apoya, pero finalmente confluye en una predicción futura catastrófica que es posible por las mismas fuerzas que alentaron todo el desarrollo histórico: el concepto de soberanía de los estados-nación, las transiciones energéticas (del viento al carbón al petróleo a la catástrofe climática) y la noción de derechos humanos universales. A mi entender, si bien el autor dedica bastantes páginas a discutir los avances en las pretensiones universalistas de los derechos humanos, no cierra tan claramente como los otros dos desarrollos, sino que, justamente, lo introduce para realizar su propuesta de futuro.
Está claro que no es un libro de historia, sino de interpretación histórica que busca utilizar el pasado para pensar el futuro, y cumple bien su objetivo.

[Jason · Rating 4 out of 5]

Interesting, but feels half-baked. The author's thesis was that empires sometimes adopt worldviews that encompass things greater than themselves: the Luso-Iberian set of empires in the 16-17C, the British Empire, and the American period of hegemony following WWII all make the grade. Each brought new ideas (the Luso-Iberian created the idea of closed seas and wrestled with human rights, for example).

I feel like there are others out there, though. Wouldn't the Greek city-states meet the defintion? China under the Ming when they literally tried to create a world order? The author is pessimistic about America standing under the threat of a Chinese expansion. The author is smarter than I am, and makes good points, but there are lots of people who have come to believe the new Chinese Empire might be oversold.

This is a book that I don't necessarily like, but it'll make me think. Isn't that what good books do?

[Denise · Rating 5 out of 5]

Heard a couple of days ago Solomon Islands agreed to house a Chinese naval base, President Biden was taken by surprise of the news, immediatly sent US dignitaries to talk with Soloman Islands officials. Had I not read Professor McCoy's book, I would not have appreciated the significance of this news. China, again, has strengthened it's strategic position in the Pacific; a threat to our national endeavors in the Pacific. Everyone in Congress or anyone interested in our nation's foreign policies must read this book. McCoy is a master at making the complications of government affairs easy and entertaining to read.

[Webalon · Rating 4 out of 5]

Western Bias

An impressive overview of modern empire.Unfortunately author shows a decided bias in favor of 20th and 21st century US and European political, cultural and "legal" norms and institutions as the gold standard of "civilized" development by which China and Russia fall short

[R. · Rating 4 out of 5]

The author explores history from the 1400’s to the present through the lens of world orders of which he begins with the Iberian (Portugal and Spain). Additional concepts that come into play are those of empire, geopolitics, energy and environment. You may not agree fully with his forecast or theoretical construct, but his argument is well presented.

[Martin · Rating 4 out of 5]

Alfred McCoy has written a book we need right now. I hope to write a review fairly soon, but I did interview McCoy today for a podcast episode that will be published in early March, about the decline of the U.S. and rise of China, and the coming calamities of climate change.

[Marren · Rating 2 out of 5]

Started out as a well-written and fairly balanced history of the world order, fell apart at the end with predictions that China is going to take over and there could be sanctions on greenhouse emissions, along with an apology for causing climate change.

[Upandatom786 · Rating 4 out of 5]

McCoy's sadly no Marxist, but he's about as good as a historian and world system theoretician can get without being a Marxist. Him and Mearsheimer are both very well worth reading if only to understand how the smart liberal realists see the world.

[Solomon J · Rating 4 out of 5]

It was a good summary of different global orders and how each one has impacted the globe. I found the most compelling part of the book to be how he included the use of energy in each world order.

[Jovany Agathe · Rating 5 out of 5]

Very good analysis and especially the three recommendations at the end.
Only downside is the anti-Chinese bias and the celebration of the West's dubious legacy.

[Tim · Rating 1 out of 5]

Couldn’t make it past the climate change bs. Too bad.

[Luay Alnahhal · Rating 3 out of 5]

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