[Marxism] Pomeranz

["Charles Brown" <cbrown@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

Louis Proyect

CB: Absence of the the spirit of Alexander and Caesar.

Charles, I doubt that either of these guys could hold a candle to Genghis
Khan.

^^^
Lou,  With respect to this debate ,1) The Central Asian societies that
followed Genghis Khan were nomadic,not settled and agricultural, like China,
Europe, India,the ones we are discussing as potential originators of
capitalism . So, at the time of the rise of capitalism, the societies in
Ghenghis Khan area didn't have a material base to "start" capitalism 2)
China didn't drop it tradition (:>)) sign onto the Khan culture. So, China
didn't have the Khan conquering tradition in this period when it was a
"candidate" capitalist culture. 3) Khan didn't have slavery like the Greeks
and Romans.

In sum, the Khan tradition of conquest didn't enter in the "contest" in
discussion. The Alexander-Caesar tradition did.

To reiterate the theoretical point, a non-ecological, non-vulgar materialist
explanation of the uniqueness of Europe has to look at the _historical_
specifics of Europe, not at the _technological_ developments.





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