Before the West: The Rise and Fall of Eastern World Orders

by Ayşe Zarakol

How would the history of international relations in 'the East' be written if we did not always read the ending – the Rise of the West and the decline of the East – into the past? What if we did not assume that Asia was just a residual category, a variant of 'not-Europe', but saw it as a space of with its own particular history and sociopolitical dynamics, not defined only by encounters with European colonialism? How would our understanding of sovereignty, as well as our theories about the causes of the decline of Great Powers and international orders, change as a result? For the first time, Before the West offers a grand narrative of (Eur)Asia as a space connected by normatively and institutionally overlapping successive world orders originating from the Mongol Empire. It also uses that history to rethink the foundational concepts and debates of international relations, such as order and decline.

Genres: History, Nonfiction, Politics, Middle East, Asia, Political Science

300 pages, Hardcover

Published March 3, 2022

Reviews

[Robert Morris · Rating 5 out of 5]

What a fantastic book. So anybody who reads a fair amount of history gets that the whole treaty of Westphalia thing is a very arbitrary starting point for modern nation-states. Sure, it was a sign post on the way from what we had before to what we have today, but it's a bit silly that people look back to 1648 as super-defining. What this book does, quite brilliantly, is attempt to set up a detailed sense of "what we had before". In doing so, Zarakol proposes to extend an entire field of academic study, international relations, back another 400 years or so, and vastly enrich it in the process. By making a persuasive case that before the European world-order there was a Eurasian world order set up by Ghenghis Khan and his successors, she makes whole new eras and geographical areas legible.

Does she pull it off? I don't know, I found it pretty persuasive. But I'm no expert. I assume that this book will, and was intended to, set up a series of arguments. At the very least she's set up a new way of looking at the 1200s-1600s. And I suspect she's done a good deal more than that. A phenomenally ambitious book, and a rare one that I believe deserves the fantastically adulatory blurbs on the back. Highly recommended.

[Yaseen · Rating 5 out of 5]

Conclusion (yes conclusion first to save you time)
I love this book. I love it because it presents a cogent history of the connectivity of the Eurasian landmass, and in particular examining what the ideas of sovereignty looked like from the viewpoint of the empires themselves. This viewpoint I feel is missed entirely, and perfectly illustrated through the book’s case study of Ibn battuta. Ibn Battuta travelled the world in a way that few singular persons had previously, however, each of the lands he visited was not unknown, ie there were pre-existing relations and trade and information flow between each ‘state’.

While this book does an excellent job of presenting the interweaving history of the Eurasian landmass after the impact of the Mongol Empire (and why that was so seismic to then shape the next 400 + years) it was less successful at the final hurdle. I was less convinced about the books attempt to answer why the westphalian model of sovereignty came to dominate the world.

However, the author notes that wasn’t the primary purpose, but instead, from an IR lens, establish that the Eurasian landmass was vastly interconnected prior to any European contact, as is somewhat claimed by those convinced of European superiority. Laying the groundwork for future research into this topic, this book does a fantastic job, and well worth the read for anybody curious to understand the continent from the POV of the actors themselves.

Preamble – factors affecting my review of the book
I read this book as a complete amateur, having no background in International Relations (IR) or even as an academic. I came across the book via the Ottoman History podcast, and was intrigued by an attempt to answer a niggling thought, that is how our current world order/international system came to be (that wasn’t rooted in Eurocentrism or working backwards from the answer today).
What not only happened to the rich Eurasian traditions, but what were the Eurasian traditions? How did Eurasian empires interact with each other? How is it that the Westphalian system dominates our current international system?

I should also note that this review is being written 6 months after I first read the book, so I will come back to edit and update should I get anything wrong, which as a human, I am likely to do.

Chinggissid World Order
The book follows the evolution of the sovereignty model that followed after the world-defining entity that was the Mongol empire, and in particular the rule of law established by Genghis Khan. I last read the book 6 months ago, so I won’t attempt to repeat it, but the book clearly delineates how this was different from what came before, and what defined the ‘Chingissid World Order’. The book continues to then follow the evolution of this model through various successor empires, Timurid empire and Ming, and then the ‘gunpowder empires’ of the safavids, ottomans and Mughals.
This thread is expertly crafted, and demonstrated the forms of diplomacy and how borders/territory was respected between these empires.

General Crisis of the 17th Century
The book then examines the breakdown of the structures of each of these empires. However a question posed in the book is how is it that the European Westphalian model came to dominate Eurasian landmass own highly evolved sovereignty model? After all, you don’t completely abandon your whole way of life just because of the martial/technological superiority of another nation.
I was less convinced of the answer, which used the basis of climate change which manifested to a period of volatility of wars, rebellions, famine and dynastic change. I think a clue comes from the Chingissid World Order sovereignty model of proving their right to rule via conquest and expanding the borders of the empire.

I think this analysis misses a trick by ignoring the capitalist tendencies of the European trading companies. Essentially, trading companies were looking to make a profit for their share holders, and to use the East india company as a case study (which I know more about thanks to ‘The Anarchy’ by William Dalrymple) almost got taxation rights over land by accident. Only after 70/80years of pillaging the land through taxation did the British Raj come to take over and colonise the people and establish their own laws and manner of rule. It is this commercial stripping of wealth from a land, alongside martial might that eventually lead to British India adopting the ‘Westphalian’ model of sovereignty. The book I feels has the cart before the horse, in that it was precarious in Asia itself whether European dominance would hold.

All in all, a fantastic book, and a must read to wonder what if the Chinggissid World Order had an opportunity to evolve to the modern world. There’s always more to say, but I think I’ll need to reread the book to be clearer in my thoughts.

[Eda Naz · Rating 4 out of 5]

avrupanın, kendilerinden önce ve kendileriyle aynı dönemde var olmuş olan diğer “büyük güç”leri tarih yazımından dışlayarak alternatif tarih yazmış olmasının sonucunu görüyoruz

[s · Rating 4 out of 5]

A really stimulating reframing. Charles V as paradigmatic early modern universal monarch was no doubt a pivotal figure, but one strongly influenced by a lifelong rivalry with another sovereign with universal ambitions, the Ottoman sultan Suleiman I. The Habsburg empire in the Eurasian context at this time is arguably peripheral, with the Ottomans, Safavids, and Mughals forming a core (1/3 of world population!) with a shared Persianate court culture, political norms, and millenarian mass sentiment (literally in this case, coming up to the year 1000 of the Islamic calendar in 1591 CE). These three then have a shared history in the Timurid central Asia of the previous century, which in turn (along with Ming China) can't be understood without looking back to the Turco-Mongol khanates that were the legacy of Genghis Khan's world-empire. The story of modernity is more than just the expansion of European political-military culture across the rest of the world out of a zero-point (whether Columbus, Charles V, the peace of Westphalia, or whatever). As is probably clear, very much a history from above, but a precisely argued one that does what it sets out to do.

[Peter Tillman]

There's an interesting essay based on a chapter of this book at https://aeon.co/essays/the-first-worl...
-- that makes me want to read her book. Sadly, no copies in my library system, and it's expensive.
But I definitely recommend reading the essay, which is provocative. She concludes:
"Unfortunately, there are enough reasons to suspect that we may be in for a similar period of turbulence and disorder in the 21st century. All the factors that were at play in the 17th century – climate change, demographic unpredictability, economic volatility, internal chaos – that took the attention of world orderers from maintaining world order are also present today."

More info at her website: http://aysezarakol.com/

[Mehmet Kalaycı · Rating 2 out of 5]

It is a description of the political and cultural forces that existed in Asia during the ascendancy and the domination of the Europeans. Saying that there were other powers at the same time is not an argument, is it? I did not really understand what the author was trying to demonstrate throughout the book.

[Pelin Hess · Rating 5 out of 5]

reading it shortly after Maalouf's Labyrinth -West and its Adversaries, this book by Zarakol is another one highlighting the general disinterest in East societies histories and their role in today's development.
Looking at the Asian societies in 12th, 16th, 17th centuries, the diversity within, the systematic they had, the population they were leading might lead us the way to look at the Silk Road not from European side of importing goods, but from Asian side, being the major producer, exporter and leading the trade.

[Anthony Nelson · Rating 5 out of 5]

A very valuable reframing of how we think about history. Before the West begins by introducing us to an alternate history, where Eurasian world orders have dominated for centuries and Europe is largely a backwater, and then takes us back to our own 16th and 17th century where such a future would not have seemed implausible at all.

The book goes on to cover how theories of world orders and international relations have structured themselves through a Western lens, seeing the rise of europe and the Westphalian order as total sea changes, rather than successors to a variety of regional and "world" orders centered in Asia and Eurasia.

It's an academic text rather than a popular history, but should be readable enough for most serious readers

[Diane · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is a fascinating work of international relations theory, written from an Asian point of view. The author, who grew up in Turkey and was educated in the UK. The author looks at the various successor states to the Mongols (including China, Central Asia, Persia, the Ottoman Empire, and Russia), and argues that they constituted a world order, similar to that which emerged in Europe a few centuries later. She examines this world order, and how its various member states interacted with other empires/countries in both Europe and Asia. She then discusses influences that the post-Mongol empires had. Finally, she looks at the collapse of the Eastern world order, and how that impacted the West's imperial rise in the 19th century. This is an academic book, so it is a bit difficult to understand in some places, and overly dependent on jargon (some of which she has made up herself). However, it is a fascinating study of a part of the world that is not well-known, and hence provides an excellent contribution to the overall literature. She also discusses potential problems with her theory, and looks at how connections between Europe and Asia have continued to fuel ideologies to the present day. I would recommend this book to anyone interested in academic writing who has an interest in Asia or the Middle East.

[Ben bi kitap okudum]

Tarihi bugünden geriye doğru okumaya çalıştığımızda sanki “Büyük Güç” olmak Batı’nın hamurunda varmış, başka türlü olması düşünülemezmiş gibi yanılsamalara düşebiliyoruz. Oysa 18. yy’a kadar dünya yönetiminde, sanatında, ticaretinde Batı’nın neredeyse adı bile anılmazken 13. yy’a damgasını vurmuş Cengiz’in dünyayı yöneten tek bir lider olma düsturunun etkileri 5 yüzyıl boyunca etkisini sürdürdü.
Düzenler gelir, geçer, değişir, etkilenir…
Bu dünya Cengiz’e kalmamış,
Batı medeniyetlerine hiç kalmaz, diyebilir miyiz?

[Hailey Egelhoff · Rating 3 out of 5]

Interesting to reconfigure key IR terms and ideas and the impact of expanding how we view sovereignty and world order can change how we think of the current state of the world. However, don’t recommend unless you’re reading it for a class or your an IR scholar cuz she is a tad dense.

[Julian Mydlil · Rating 3 out of 5]

Thought provoking nuanced reframing of the traditional eurocentric takes on history and IR theory, in particular the last chapter of Part I and all of Part II. Though it was a bit challenging at times - my previous understanding of the 13th-16th century history she discussed wasn't too great.

[Mubin Khaja · Rating 5 out of 5]

I quite enjoyed this work. Zarakol makes many cogent arguments to support her claim that Asia was its own autonomous region with its own geopolitical practices, that were recognised and understood across Asia (travellers often seemed to be familiar with different regions). Think of it as an expanded version of how almost all Asian communities know to remove your shoes when entering a house.

She starts with explaining how seemingly disparate Asian empires (China, Ottomans) actually shared a common ancestry in the Mongol conquests commonly associated with Genghis Khan. The Asian World Order germinated from the four distinct houses, or Khanates. The four Khanates nevertheless retained common ideals, which were developed from a mutually reinforcing practice of conquests needing post hoc justifications, and these justifications risking staleness without fresh conquest.

Fundamentally these ideals were concerned with how the authority of the Khan/Ruler should be articulated, particularly with regard to existing authority in the conquered regions. Broadly, there was either vertical centralisation, in the form of domination (where one clearly supersedes the other) or fusion (between religious and political).

Domination was based on the idea of extreme centralisation standing for universal sovereignty. Hence, political leaders embraced the lawmaking role, and previously autonomous entities (religious orders) were brought under control.

However, the more successful empires (China, Ottomans, Mughals) eventually settled on fusion. For example, Islamic empires accommodated a religious leadership class. Fusion also negated the need for constant conquests to legitimise, but which also inadvertently destabilised, the empire.

Zarakol summarises the development of Asian empires as a hollowing out process, whereby Inner Asia rose first, and thereafter weakened and what were previously peripheries (west and east Asia) were new centres of gravity. She likens this process to how the 20th century US-USSR world order traced its ancestry to European Great Power system. (tree trunk hollowed out while branches remained).

Zarakol still has time to get to the rise of the West. She notes that the Westphalian approach projects back European dominance into 16th century as though Europe was primed to rise. She counters that that world needs to be understood instead by the core of post Timurid empires in south-west Asia, and the European regional order’s attempts to link to that. Hence, any attempts to describe the rise of the West needs to account for the dismantling of the post Chinggisid Asian world order.

Zarakol’s approach is to explore how key actors in the Asian world order changed their behaviour and relations with one another. For Zarakol, this was due to changes in the ‘structure, defined by her as factors beyond human agency such as climate events. For Zarakol, the structural canvas preceding the rise of the West included the momentum halting ‘Seventeenth Century General Crisis” (prolonged rebellions, civil wars and demographic decline, Spanish ‘price revolution’ or Little Ice Age).

The changes in Asia were subtle. Rather than a story of catastrophic and irreversible decline, Zarakol observes that most polities recovered, at least in material terms. Nevertheless, there remained the perception that something was declining, with less ambition and interaction between each other (overland trade routes were not as widely used), and an inward turn.

At the same time, Zarakol highlights that in Europe there rose a potent combination of nationalism and race thinking (along with a broad religious uniformity), with a zeal towards carving and exploiting the rest of the world that was unmatched by any previous Asian polity, and indeed system.

It would have strengthened Zarakol’s account if she had compared, and highligthed, the qualitative difference between the Asian world order and this new European system (which did function more like a system). Clearly there was an evolution from the peaceful co-existence of the Asian empires to the restless striving of European empires who cooperated in their competition (think of that cartoon of China being divided up).

Paradoxically, although the focus of her work was on Asia, it would have been better if Zarakol had also offered her own account of the rise of the West, if at the very least to counter the notion that the rise of the West was inherent. A summary of developments, such as Europe’s headstart in industrialisation, development of inorganic energy sources, or even the advent of joint stock corporations could have underlined more clearly the challenges that Asian empires now faced.
Nevertheless, Zarakol has here a seminal work, and she recognises its significance. She offers a convincing justification for the sweep and scale of her work, emphasising that the currently fashionable microhistorical focus on unveiling extra-European world will not automatically resolve Eurocentrism. There should be a synthesising, global non Eurocentric vision to challenge. Otherwise, Eurocentrism will continue filling in the blanks.

[Osman Tümay · Rating 3 out of 5]

Bu kitabı okurken manipüle edilmeye çalışıldığım hissinden kurtulmayı bir türlü başaramadım. Yine de, önemli bir ilk adım oluşturduğu ve bu yüzden okunabileceği kanısındayım.

[Leo · Rating 4 out of 5]

Introductory read

[Emi(o˘◡˘o) · Rating 3 out of 5]

the insane tales of what ancient man would do to achieve world domination, Chinggisid version