Why America is Not a New Rome by Vaclav Smil - Bookswagon
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Home > History and Archaeology > History > History of the Americas > History of the Americas: pre-Columbian period > Why America is Not a New Rome
Why America is Not a New Rome

Why America is Not a New Rome


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About the Book

America's post--Cold War strategic dominance and its pre-recession affluence inspired pundits to make celebratory comparisons to ancient Rome at its most powerful. Now, with America no longer perceived as invulnerable, engaged in protracted fighting in Iraq and Afghanistan, and suffering the worst economic downturn since the Great Depression, comparisons are to the bloated, decadent, ineffectual later Empire. In Why America Is Not a New Rome, Vaclav Smil looks at these comparisons in detail, going deeper than the facile analogy-making of talk shows and glossy magazine articles. He finds profound differences. Smil, a scientist and a lifelong student of Roman history, focuses on several fundamental concerns: the very meaning of empire; the actual extent and nature of Roman and American power; the role of knowledge and innovation; and demographic and economic basics--population dynamics, illness, death, wealth, and misery. America is not a latter-day Rome, Smil finds, and we need to understand this in order to look ahead without the burden of counterproductive analogies. Superficial similarities do not imply long-term political, demographic, or economic outcomes identical to Rome's.

About the Author :
Vaclav Smil is a Distinguished Professor Emeritus at the University of Manitoba. He is the author of more than thirty books, including Harvesting the Biosphere: What We Have Taken from Nature and, most recently, Made in the USA: The Rise and Retreat of American Manufacturing, both published by the MIT Press. In 2010 he was named by Foreign Policy as one of the Top 100 Global Thinkers. In 2013 Bill Gates wrote on his website that "there is no author whose books I look forward to more than Vaclav Smil."

Review :
[T]his book is both a polemic and a work of scholarship. -- Daniel Headrick, Technology and Culture Smil (Univ. of Manitoba, Canada) has written an entertaining response to authors who have compared the US to the Roman Empire... -- S. Prisco III, CHOICE


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Product Details
  • ISBN-13: 9780262195935
  • Publisher: MIT Press Ltd
  • Publisher Imprint: MIT Press
  • Height: 229 mm
  • Returnable: N
  • Weight: 612 gr
  • ISBN-10: 0262195933
  • Publisher Date: 29 Jan 2010
  • Binding: Hardback
  • Language: English
  • Spine Width: 17 mm
  • Width: 178 mm


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