The term Western world, the West or the Occident (Latin Latin is an Italic language historically spoken in Latium and Ancient Rome. Through the Roman conquest, Latin spread throughout the Mediterranean and a large part of Europe. Romance languages such as Italian, French, Catalan, Romanian, Spanish, and Portuguese are descended from Latin, while many others, especially European languages, including: occidens -sunset, -west, as distinct from the Orient The Orient is a term which simply means the "east". It originated in Western Asia to describe the parts of the world that were in the "far east" of their known world at the time. It is now used in English as a metonym to describe Eastern Asia, and depending on nationality, in reference to certain Southeastern Asian minorities) can have multiple meanings dependent on its context (e.g., the time period, the region or social situation).[1] Accordingly, the basic definition of what constitutes "the West" varies, expanding and contracting over time, in relation to various historical circumstances. Some historians[who?] believe the West originated in the northern and eastern Mediterranean with ancient Greece The term ancient Greece refers to the period of Greek history lasting from the Greek Dark Ages ca. 1100 BC and the Dorian invasion, to 146 BC and the Roman conquest of Greece after the Battle of Corinth. It is generally considered to be the seminal culture which provided the foundation of Western civilization and shaped cultures throughout and ancient Rome Ancient Rome was a civilization that grew out of a small agricultural community founded on the Italian Peninsula as early as the 10th century BC. Located along the Mediterranean Sea, it became one of the largest empires in the ancient world. Over time, their associated empires grew first to the east and south, conquering and absorbing many older great civilizations; later, they grew to the north and west to include Western Europe Western Europe refers to the countries generally in the westernmost half of Europe, but the definition is complex and carries political connotations. As a result, geographically eastern countries that steered clear of Soviet influence during the Cold War are usually included, while Western members of the former Eastern Bloc (Czech Republic, Poland).

Other historians, such as Carroll Quigley (Evolution of Civilizations), contend that Western Civilization was born around 400 AD, after the total collapse of the Western Roman Empire The Western Roman Empire refers to the western half of the Roman Empire, from its division by Diocletian in 285; the other half of the Roman Empire was the Eastern Roman Empire, today widely known as the Byzantine Empire, leaving a vacuum for new ideas to flourish that were impossible in Classical societies. In either view, between the fall The decline of the Roman Empire refers to both the gradual disintegration of the economy of Rome and the barbarian invasions that were its final doom. The English historian Edward Gibbon, author of The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire made this concept part of the framework of the English language, but he was neither the first nor the last to of the Western Roman Empire and the Renaissance The Renaissance was a cultural movement that spanned roughly the 14th to the 17th century, beginning in Florence in the Late Middle Ages and later spreading to the rest of Europe. The term is also used more loosely to refer to the historic era, but since the changes of the Renaissance were not uniform across Europe, this is a general use of the, the West experienced a period of considerable decline,[2] known as the Middle Ages The Middle Ages of European history are a period in history which lasted for roughly a millennium, commonly dated from the fall of the Western Roman Empire in the 5th century to the beginning of the Early Modern Period in the 16th century, marked by the division of Western Christianity in the Reformation, the rise of humanism in the Italian, which include the Dark Ages The concept of a Dark Age was created by the Italian scholar Petrarch in the 1330s as an age which separated his own from the riches of classical antiquity and was originally intended as a sweeping criticism of the character of Late Latin literature. Later historians expanded the term to refer to the transitional period between Classical Roman and the Crusades The Crusades were a series of religiously-sanctioned military campaigns waged by much of Latin Christian Europe. The specific crusades to regain control of the Holy Land were fought over a period of nearly 200 years, between 1095 and 1291. Other campaigns in Spain and Eastern Europe continued into the 15th century. The Crusades were fought mainly. The knowledge of the ancient Western world was partly preserved during this period due to the survival of the Eastern Roman Empire The Byzantine Empire or Eastern Roman Empire, known to its inhabitants as the Roman Empire, the Empire of the Romans and also as Romania (Ῥωμανία, Rhōmanía), was the continuation of the Roman Empire during the Middle Ages, centered on its capital of Constantinople, and ruled by Emperors in direct succession to the ancient Roman Emperors; it was also greatly expanded by the Arabs An Arab is a person who identifies as such on ethnic, linguistic or cultural grounds. The plural form, Arabs (العرب al-ʿarab), refers to the ethnocultural group at large mostly by the concurrent ascendency of the Islamic Golden Age The Islamic Golden Age, also sometimes known as the Islamic Renaissance, is traditionally dated from the 7th to 13th centuries C.E., but has been extended to the 15th and 16th centuries by more recent scholarship. During this period, artists, engineers, scholars, poets, philosophers, geographers and traders in the Islamic world contributed to the.[3] The Arab importation Islamic contributions to Medieval Europe were numerous, affecting such varied areas as art, architecture , medicine, argriculture, music, language, education, law, and technology. From the 10th to the 13th century, Europe absorbed knowledge from the Islamic civilization. In the early 20th century, a "growing number of scholars...recognize of both the Ancient Classical antiquity is a broad term for a long period of cultural history centered on the Mediterranean Sea, comprising the interlocking civilizations of Ancient Greece and Ancient Rome collectively known as the Greco-Roman world and new technology from the Middle East The Middle East is a region that spans southwestern Asia, southeastern Europe and northeastern Africa. It has no clear boundaries, often used as a synonym to Near East, in opposition to Far East. The term "Middle East" was popularized around 1900 in the United Kingdom. The corresponding adjective to Middle East is Middle-Eastern and the and the Orient The Orient is a term which simply means the "east". It originated in Western Asia to describe the parts of the world that were in the "far east" of their known world at the time. It is now used in English as a metonym to describe Eastern Asia, and depending on nationality, in reference to certain Southeastern Asian minorities to Renaissance Europe represented “one of the largest technology transfers in world history.”[4][5]

Since the Renaissance The Renaissance was a cultural movement that spanned roughly the 14th to the 17th century, beginning in Florence in the Late Middle Ages and later spreading to the rest of Europe. The term is also used more loosely to refer to the historic era, but since the changes of the Renaissance were not uniform across Europe, this is a general use of the, the West evolved beyond the influence of the ancient Greeks, Romans and Muslims due to the Commercial The Commercial Revolution was a period of European economic expansion, colonialism, and mercantilism which lasted from approximately the sixteenth century until the early eighteenth century. Beginning with the Crusades, Europeans rediscovered spices, silks, and other commodities rare in Europe. This development created a new desire for trade, and,[6] Scientific In the history of science, the Scientific Revolution was a period when new ideas in physics, astronomy, biology, human anatomy, chemistry, and other sciences led to a rejection of doctrines that had prevailed from Ancient Greece through the Middle Ages, and laid the foundation of modern science. According to the majority of scholars, the,[7] and Industrial Revolutions The Industrial Revolution was a period in the late 18th and early 19th centuries when major changes in agriculture, manufacturing, mining, and transportation had a profound effect on the socioeconomic and cultural conditions in Britain. The changes subsequently spread throughout Europe, North America, and eventually the world. The onset of the,[8] and the expansion of the Christian The first known usage of the term Χριστιανός can be found in the New Testament in Acts 11:26: "the disciples were first called Christians at Antioch." They were disciples and followers of Jesus Christ. The other two New Testament uses of the word also refer to the public identity of those who follow Jesus. The Jewish king said peoples of Western European empires, and particularly the globe-spanning empires of the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries. Since the Age of Discovery The Age of Discovery, also known as the Age of Exploration, was a period in history starting in the 15th Century and continuing into the 17th Century, during which Europeans explored the world by ocean searching for trading partners and particular trade goods. The most desired trading goods were gold, silver and spices. Western Europeans used the and Columbus Christopher Columbus was a Genoese navigator, colonizer and explorer whose voyages across the Atlantic Ocean—funded by Queen Isabella of Spain—led to general European awareness of the American continents in the Western Hemisphere. Although not the first to reach the Americas from Europe—he was preceded by the Norse, led by Leif Ericson, who, the notion of the West expanded to include the Americas The Americas, or America, are the lands of the Western hemisphere or New World, comprising the continents of North America and South America with their associated islands and regions. America may be ambiguous in English, as it is more commonly used to refer to the United States of America. The Americas cover 8.3% of the Earth's total surface area, though much of the Americas have considerable pre-Western cultural influence This list of pre-Columbian civilizations includes those civilizations and cultures of the Americas which flourished prior to the European colonization of the Americas. These pre-Columbian civilizations established characteristics such as permanent or urban settlements, agriculture, and complex societal hierarchies. Australia Australia , officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a country in the southern hemisphere comprising the mainland, which is both the world's smallest continent and the world's largest island, the island of Tasmania, and numerous other islands in the Indian and Pacific Oceans.N4 It is the only area of land simultaneously considered a continent, and New Zealand New Zealand is an island country in the south-western Pacific Ocean comprising two main landmasses , and numerous smaller islands, most notably Stewart Island/Rakiura and the Chatham Islands. The indigenous Māori named New Zealand Aotearoa, commonly translated as The Land of the Long White Cloud. The Realm of New Zealand also includes the Cook are considered part of Western culture due to their former status as settler colonies of Western Christian nations. Generally speaking, the current consensus would locate the West, at the very least, in the cultures and peoples of Europe, North America, Israel, Australia and New Zealand. However nations such as Argentina, Uruguay, Chile and Brazil are heavily Western in the traditional sense of the term, the common element being the omnipresence of Judeo-Christian culture.

When referring to current events, the term "Western World" often includes[citation needed] developed countries The term developed country is used to describe countries that have a high level of development according to some criteria. Which criteria, and which countries are classified as being developed, is a contentious issue and there is fierce debate about this. Economic criteria have tended to dominate discussions. One such criterion is income per in Asia, such as Japan Japan is an island nation in East Asia. Located in the Pacific Ocean, it lies to the east of the Sea of Japan, People's Republic of China, North Korea, South Korea and Russia, stretching from the Sea of Okhotsk in the north to the East China Sea and Taiwan in the south. The characters which make up Japan's name mean "sun-origin", which, Singapore Singapore , officially the Republic of Singapore, is an island city-state located at the southern tip of the Malay Peninsula, lying 137 kilometres (85 mi) north of the equator, south of the Malaysian state of Johor and north of Indonesia's Riau Islands. At 710.2 km2 (274.2 sq mi), Singapore, a microstate and the smallest nation in Southeast Asia,, Taiwan Taiwan , also known as Formosa (福爾摩沙; from Portuguese (Ilha) Formosa, meaning "beautiful (island)"), is an island group located in East Asia between the South China Sea and the East China Sea off the southeastern coast of mainland China. It is well-known as the major area under the effective jurisdiction of the Republic of China (, and South Korea South Korea, officially the Republic of Korea (Korean: 대한민국, pronounced [tɛːhanminɡuk̚] ( listen)) and often referred to as Korea, is a country in East Asia, located on the southern half of the Korean Peninsula. Also known as the "Land of the Morning Calm", it is neighbored by China to the west and Japan to the east,, that have strong economic, political and military ties to Western Europe, NATO or the United States. While these countries also have substantial Western influence and similarities in their cultures, they nonetheless maintain largely different and distinctive cultures, religions (although Christianity is a major religion The practice of Christianity in Korea has a relatively short history, but after a difficult beginning it has seen significant growth and success. The deeply-rooted traditional religions of Korean shamanism, Buddhism and Confucianism held strong for many centuries and have been challenged by Christianity in a meaningful way only since 1784 when the in South Korea), languages, customs, and worldviews that are products of their own indigenous development, rather than solely Western influences. Japan and South Korea, in particular, are the only Asian members of the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development The Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (in French: Organisation de coopération et de développement économiques, OCDE) is an international organisation of 30 countries that accept the principles of representative democracy and free-market economy. Most OECD members are high-income economies with a high HDI and are regarded as (OECD) and the two leading full democracies The Economist has in a study examined the state of democracy in 167 countries and attempted to quantify this with an Economist Intelligence Unit Index of Democracy which focused on five general categories: electoral process and pluralism, civil liberties, functioning of government, political participation and political culture. According to in Asia, having a high standard of living and a high level of human development Human Development is a development paradigm that is about much more than the rise or fall of national incomes. It is about creating an environment in which people can develop their full potential and lead productive, creative lives in accord with their needs and interests. People are the real wealth of nations. Development is thus about expanding. All of these are amongst the generally accepted political or economic characteristics of Western nations.[citation needed]

There is debate among some as to whether Eastern Europe Eastern Europe is an ancient term given redefinition in modern commentary post-World War II that some now claim is outdated and useless — in the simplest geographical sense, it refers to geographical regions in Europe east and southeast of Germany; In meanings encompassing political or economic overtones, the term is one that applies to the and Latin America Latin America is a region of the Americas where Romance languages (i.e., those derived from Latin) – particularly Spanish and Portuguese, and variably French – are primarily spoken.Latin America has an area of approximately (7,880,000 sq mi), or almost 3.9% of the Earth's surface. As of 2008, its population was estimated at more than 569 are in separate categories of their own or if they are part of the "West". Culturally Eastern Europe and Latin America are usually more or less accepted into the 'West'. They, however, do not fill the traditional economic and living standard criteria which one associates with "The West".[9]

Contents

Historic Criterions of West in the European Continent

Medieval appearance of parliaments (the dietal-system), self-government like status of big royal/imperial cities, medieval appearance of banking systems and social effects and status of urban bourgeoisie, medieval appearance of universities and the medieval appearance of secular intellectuals, Philosophy: Scholasticism and humanist philosophy,the knight-culture and the effects of crusades in the Holy Land, medieval usage of Latin alphabet and medieval spread of movable type printing, The medieval western theatre: Mystery or cycle plays and morality passion plays, The architecture and fine-arts: Romanesque Gothic and Renaissance styles.

Western Culture

Main article: Western culture Western culture refers to cultures of European origin Further information: History of Western civilization The opposition of a European "West" to an Asiatic "East" has its roots in Classical Antiquity, with then Persian Wars where the Greek city states were opposing the expansion of the Achaemenid Empire. The Biblical opposition of Israel and Assyria from a European perspective was recast into these terms by early Christian authors

The term "Western culture" is used very broadly to refer to a heritage Cultural heritage is the legacy of physical artifacts and intangible attributes of a group or society that are inherited from past generations, maintained in the present and bestowed for the benefit of future generations. Often though, what is considered cultural heritage by one generation may be rejected by the next generation, only to be revived of social norms Social norms are the behavioral expectations and cues within a society or group. This sociological term has been defined as "the rules that a group uses for appropriate and inappropriate values, beliefs, attitudes and behaviors." These rules may be explicit or implicit. Failure to follow the rules can result in severe punishments,, ethical values Ethics is a branch of philosophy which seeks to address questions about morality, such as what the fundamental semantic, ontological, and epistemic nature of ethics or morality is , how moral values should be determined (normative ethics), how a moral outcome can be achieved in specific situations (applied ethics), how moral capacity or moral, traditional customs However, on a more basic theoretical level, tradition can be seen as information or composed of information. For that which is brought into the present from the past, in a particular societal context, is information. This is even more fundamental than particular acts or practices even if repeated over a long sequence of time, religious A religion is an organized approach to human spirituality which usually encompasses a set of narratives, symbols, beliefs and practices, often with a supernatural or transcendent quality, that give meaning to the practitioner's experiences of life through reference to a higher power, God or gods, or ultimate truth. It may be expressed through beliefs, political systems A political system is a system of politics and government. It is usually compared to the legal system, economic system, cultural system, and other social systems. It is different from them, and can be generally defined on a spectrum from left, e.g. communism, to the right, e.g. fascism. However, this is a very simplified view of a much more, and specific artifacts A cultural artifact is a human-made object which gives information about the culture of its creator and users. The artifact may change over time in what it represents, how it appears and how and why it is used as the culture changes over time. Usage of this term encompasses the type of archaeological artifact which is recovered at archaeological and technologies Technology is a broad concept that deals with an animal species' usage and knowledge of tools and crafts, and how it affects an animal species' ability to control and adapt to its environment. Technology is a term with origins in the Greek "technologia", "τεχνολογία" — "techne", "τέχνη" and &. Specifically, Western culture may imply:

The concept of Western culture is generally linked to the classical definition of the Western world. In this definition, Western culture is the set of literary, scientific, political, artistic and philosophical principles which set it apart from other civilizations. Much of this set of traditions and knowledge is collected in the Western canon. [10]

The term has come to apply to countries whose history is strongly marked by Western European immigration or settlement, such as the Americas, and Australasia, and is not restricted to Western Europe.

Some tendencies that define modern Western societies are the existence of political pluralism, prominent subcultures or countercultures (such as New Age movements), increasing cultural syncretism resulting from globalization and human migration.

Historical divisions

The origins of the word "West" in terms of geopolitical boundaries started in the 1900s[citation needed]. Prior to this, most people would have thoughts about different nations, languages, individuals, and geographical regions, but with no idea of Western nations as we know it today. Many world maps were so crude and inaccurate before the 1800s that geographical and political differences would be harder to measure. Few would have access to good maps and even fewer had access to accurate descriptions of who lived in far away lands. Western thought as we think of it today, is shaped by ideas of the 1900s and 1800s, originating mainly in Europe. What we think of as Western thought today is defined as Greco-Roman and Judeo-Christian culture, the Renaissance, the Enlightenment and colonialism. As a consequence the term "Western thought" is, at times, unhelpful and vague, since it can define separate, though related, sets of traditions and values:

Hellenic

The Ancient Greek world, circa 550 BC

The Hellenic division between the barbarians and the Greeks contrasted in many societies the Greek-speaking culture of the Greek settlements around the Mediterranean to the surrounding non-Greek cultures. Herodotus considered the Persian Wars of the early 5th century BC a conflict of Europa versus Asia[citation needed] (which he considered to be all land North and East of the Sea of Marmara, respectively)[citation needed]. The terms "West" and "East" were not used by any Greek author to describe that conflict. The anachronistic application of those terms to that division entails a stark logical contradiction, given that, when the term West appeared, it was used in opposition to the Greeks and Greek-speaking culture.[citation needed]

Western society is sometimes claimed to trace its cultural origins to both Greek thought and Christian religion, thus following an evolution that began in ancient Greece, continued through the Roman Empire and, with the coming of Christianity (which has its origins in the Middle East), spread throughout Europe.

The major Hellenistic realms; the Ptolemaic kingdom (dark blue); the Seleucid empire (yellow); Macedon (green) and Epirus (pink).

However, the conquest of the western parts of the Roman Empire by Germanic peoples and the subsequent dominance by the Western Christian Papacy (which held combined political and spiritual authority, a state of affairs absent from Greek civilization in all its stages), resulted into a rupture of the previously existing ties between the Latin West and Greek thought,[11] including Christian Greek thought. The Great Schism and the Fourth Crusade confirmed this deviation. Hence, the Medieval West is limited to Western Christendom only, as the Greeks and other European peoples not under the authority of the Papacy are not included in it. The clearly Greek-influenced form of Christianity, Orthodoxy, is more linked to Eastern than Western Europe. On the other hand, the Modern West, emerging after the Renaissance as a new civilization, has been influenced by (its own interpretation of) Greek thought, which was preserved in the Byzantine (East Roman) Empire and the medieval Islamic world during the Medieval West's Dark Ages and transmitted therefrom by emigration of scholars, courtly marriages, and Latin translations. The Renaissance in the West emerged partly from currents within the Roman (Byzantine) Empire. Moreover, European peoples not included in Western Christendom such as the Greeks have redefined their relationship to this new, secular, variant of Western civilization, and have increasingly participated in it since then.

Thus the idea of Western society being influenced from (but not being the single evolution of) ancient Greek thought makes sense only for the post-Renaissance period of Western history.

The Roman Empire

The Roman Empire under Trajan in 117 AD.

Ancient Rome (510 BC-AD 476) was a civilization that grew from a city-state founded on the Italian Peninsula circa the 9th century BC to a massive empire straddling the Mediterranean Sea. In its twelve-century existence, Roman civilization shifted from a monarchy, to a republic, to an autocratic empire. It came to dominate Western Europe, the Balkans and the entire area surrounding the Mediterranean Sea through conquest using the Roman legions and then through cultural assimilation by giving Roman privileges and eventually citizenship to the whole empire. Nonetheless, despite its great legacy, a number of factors led to the eventual decline of the Roman Empire.

The Western Roman Empire eventually broke into several kingdoms in the 5th century due to civil wars, corruption, and devastating Germanic Invasions from such tribes as the Goths, the Franks and the Vandals; the Eastern Roman Empire, governed from Constantinople, is usually referred to as the Byzantine Empire after 476, the traditional date for the "fall of the Western Roman Empire" and for the subsequent onset of the Early Middle Ages. The Eastern Roman Empire survived the fall of the West, and protected Roman legal and cultural traditions combining them with Greek and Christian elements, for another thousand years.

The Roman Empire succeeded the about 500 year-old Roman Republic (510 BC - 1st century BC), which had been weakened by the conflict between Gaius Marius and Sulla and the civil war of Julius Caesar against Pompey and Marcus Brutus. During these struggles hundreds of senators were killed, and the Roman Senate had been refilled with loyalists of the First Triumvirate and later those of the Second Triumvirate.

Several dates are commonly proposed to mark the transition from Republic to Empire, including the date of Julius Caesar's appointment as perpetual roman dictator (44 BC), the victory of Caesar's heir Octavian at the Battle of Actium (September 2, 31 BC), and the Roman Senate's granting to Octavian the honorific Augustus. (January 16, 27 BC). Octavian/Augustus officially proclaimed that he had saved the Roman Republic and carefully disguised his power under republican forms; consuls continued to be elected, tribunes of the plebeians continued to offer legislation, and senators still debated in the Roman Curia. However, it was Octavian who influenced everything and controlled the final decisions, and in final analysis, had the legions to back him up, if it ever became necessary.

Roman expansion began long before the state was changed into an Empire and reached its zenith under emperor Trajan with the conquest of Dacia in AD 106. During this territorial peak the Roman Empire controlled approximately 5 900 000 km² (2,300,000 sq.mi.) of land surface and had population of 100 million. From the time of Caesar to the Fall of the Western Empire, Rome dominated Western Eurasia and the Mediterranean, comprising the majority of its population. Ancient Rome has contributed greatly to the development of law, war, art, literature, architecture, technology and language in the Western world, and its history continues to have a major influence on the world today.

The Roman Empire is where the idea of the "West" began to emerge. Due to Rome's central location at the heart of the Empire, "West" and "East" were terms used to denote provinces west and east of the capital itself. Therefore, Iberia (Portugal and Spain), Gaul (France), Africa (Tunisia, Algeria, and Morocco) and Britannia were all part of the "West", while Greece, Anatolia, Syria, and Egypt were part of the "East." Italy itself was considered central up until the reforms of Diocletian, when the idea of formally dividing the Empire into true Eastern and Western halves was introduced. In 395, the Roman Empire formally split into a Western Roman Empire and an Eastern one, each with their own emperors, capitals, and governments, although ostensibly they still belonged to one formal Empire. The dissolution of the Western half (nominally in 476, but in truth a long process that ended by 500) left only the Eastern Empire alive, and for centuries the East continued to call themselves Eastern Romans, while the West began to think in terms of Latins (those living in the old Western Empire) and Greeks (those inside the Roman remnant to the east).

Christian schism

Religious split in Europe Roman Catholicism Orthodox Christianity Protestantism Sunni Islam Shia Islam Buddhism Christianity and other religions in the world.

In the early 4th century, the Roman Emperor Constantine the Great established the city of Constantinople as the capital of the Eastern Roman Empire. The Eastern Empire included lands east of the Adriatic Sea and bordering on the Eastern Mediterranean and parts of the Black Sea. These two divisions of the Eastern and Western Empires were reflected in the administration of the Christian Church, with Rome and Constantinople debating and arguing over whether either city was the capital of Christianity. As the eastern and western churches spread their influence, the line between "East" and "West" can be described as moving, but generally followed a cultural divide that was defined by the existence of the Byzantine empire and the fluctuating power and influence of the church in Rome. Some, including Huntington, theorized that this cultural division still existed during the Cold War as the approximate western boundary of those countries that were allied with the Soviet Union; others have criticized these views on the basis that they confuse the Eastern Roman Empire with Russia, especially considering the fact that the country that had the most historical roots in Byzantium, Greece, was allied with the West during the Cold War.

Under Charlemagne, the Franks established an empire that was recognized as the Holy Roman Empire by the Christian Patriarch of Rome, offending the Roman Emperor in Constantinople. The crowning of the Emperor by the Pope led to the assumption that the highest power was the papal hierarchy, establishing, until the Protestant Reformation, the civilization of Western Christendom. The Latin Rite Christian Church of western and central Europe headed by the Patriarch of Rome split with the eastern, Greek-speaking Patriarchates during the Great Schism. Meanwhile, the extent of each expanded, as Scandinavia, Germany, Britain, and the other non-Christian lands of the northwest were converted by the Western Church, while Russia and much of Eastern Europe were converted by the Eastern Church.

In this context, the Protestant reformation may be viewed as a schism within the Latin Church. Martin Luther, in the wake of precursors, broke with the Pope and with the Emperor, backed by many of the German princes. These changes were adopted by the Scandinavian kings. Later, the commoner Jean Cauvin (John Calvin) assumed the religio-political leadership in Geneva, a former ecclesiastical city whose prior ruler had been the Bishop. The English King later improvised on the Lutheran model, but subsequently many Calvinist doctrines were adopted by popular dissenters, leading to the English Civil War. Both royalists and dissenters colonized North America, eventually resulting in an independent United States of America.

The Colonial "West"

The Reformation and consequent dissolution of Western Christendom as even a theoretical unitary political body, resulted in the Thirty Years War, ending in the Peace of Westphalia, which enshrined the concept of the nation-state and the principle of absolute national sovereignty in international law. These concepts of a world of nation-states, coupled with the ideologies of the Enlightenment, the coming of modernity, the Scientific Revolution,[12] and the Industrial Revolution,[13] produced powerful political and economic institutions that have come to influence (or been imposed upon) most nations of the world today. Historians agree that the Industrial Revolution was one of the most important events in history.[14] The most significant inventions had their origins in the Western world, primarily Europe and the United States.[15]

This process of influence (and imposition) began with the voyages of discovery, colonization, conquest, and exploitation of Spain and Portugal; it continued with the rise of the Dutch East India Company, and the creation and expansion of the British and French colonial empires. Due to the reach of these empires, Western institutions expanded throughout the world. Even after demands for self-determination from subject peoples within Western empires were met with decolonization, these institutions persisted; one specific example was the requirement that post-colonial societies were made to form nation-states (in the Western tradition), which often created arbitrary boundaries and borders that did not necessarily represent a whole nation, people, or culture, and are often the cause of international conflicts and friction even to this day. Though the overt colonial era has passed, Western nations, as comparatively rich, well-armed, and culturally powerful states, still wield a large degree of influence throughout the world.

Palestinian-American literary critic Edward Said uses the term occident in his discussion of orientalism. According to his binary, the West, or Occident, created a romanticized vision of the East, or Orient, in order to justify colonial and imperialist intentions. This Occident-Orient binary is focused on the Western vision of the East instead of any truths about the East. His theories are rooted in Hegel's Master-slave dialectic; the Occident would not exist without the Orient and vice versa. Further, Western writers created this irrational, feminine, weak "Other" to contrast with the rational, masculine, strong West because of a need to create a difference between the two that would justify imperialist ambitions. Said influenced Indian-American theorist Homi K. Bhabha.

The Cold War

During the Cold War, a new definition emerged. The Earth was divided into three "worlds". The First World, analogous in this context to what was called the West, was composed of NATO members and other countries aligned with the United States. The Second World was the Eastern bloc in the Soviet sphere of influence, including the Soviet Union and Warsaw Pact countries. It included some Central European countries (like The German Democratic Republic, Czechoslovakia Hungary and Poland) which had Western type culture. The Third World consisted of countries unaligned with either, and important members included India and Yugoslavia; some include the People's Republic of China, though this is disputed,[citation needed] as the People's Republic of China was communist, had friendly relations—at certain times—with the Soviet bloc, and had a significant degree of importance in global geopolitics.

European trade blocs as of the late 1980s. EEC member states are marked in blue, EFTA – green, and Comecon – red. East and West in 1980, as defined by the Cold War. The Cold War had divided Europe politically into East and West, with the Iron Curtain splitting Central Europe.

There were a number of countries which did not fit comfortably into this neat definition of partition, including Switzerland, Sweden, Austria and the Republic of Ireland, which chose to be neutral. Finland was under the Soviet Union's military sphere of influence (see FCMA treaty) but remained neutral, was not communist, nor was it a member of the Warsaw Pact or Comecon but a member of the EFTA since 1986, and was west of the Iron Curtain. In 1955, when Austria again became a fully independent republic, it did so under the condition that it remain neutral, but as a country to the west of the Iron Curtain, it was in the United States sphere of influence. Spain did not join NATO until 1982, towards the end of the Cold War and after the death of the authoritarian Franco.

Modern definitions

The exact scope of the Western world is somewhat subjective in nature, depending on whether cultural, economic, spiritual or political criteria are employed. In general however these definitions always include the following countries: the countries of Western Europe, South Africa, North America, Israel, Australia and New Zealand. These are Western European or Western European-derived nations which enjoy relatively strong economies and stable governments, allow freedom of religion, have chosen democracy as a form of governance, favor capitalism and international trade, are heavily influenced by Judeo-Christian values, and have some form of political and military alliance or cooperation.

Many anthropologists, sociologists and historians oppose "the West and the Rest" in a categorical manner.[16] The same has been done by Malthusian demographers with a sharp distinction between European and non-European family systems. Among anthropologists, this includes Durkheim, Dumont and Lévi-Strauss.[16]

As the term "Western world" does not have a strict international definition, governments do not use the term in legislation of international treaties and instead rely on other definitions.

Cultural

See: Western Culture.
Latin alphabet world distribution. The dark green areas shows the countries where this alphabet is the sole main script. The light green shows the countries where the alphabet co-exists with other scripts

From a cultural and sociological approach the Western world is defined as including all cultures that are (directly derived from) European cultures, i.e. Europe, the Americas (North and South America), Israel, Australia and New Zealand. Together these countries constitute Western society[17][18][19]

In the 20th century, Christianity declined in influence in many western countries, in Western Europe and elsewhere. Secularism (separating religion from politics and science) increased. However, while church attendance is in decline, most Westerners nominally identify themselves as Christians (e.g. 70% in the UK) and occasionally attend church on major occasions. In the United States, Christianity continues to play an important societal role, thus helping to maintain Christianity's important role in Western culture. The official religion of the United Kingdom and some Nordic countries is Christianity, even though the majority of European countries have no official religion. Despite this, Christianity, in its different forms, remains the largest faith in most Western countries. Thus another definition of Occident would include reference to this majority Christian content within the culture.

Modern Political

Political ratings of countries according to Freedom House’s survey, 2008:
Free, electoral democracies Partially free, electoral democracies Partially free, not electoral democracies Not free, not electoral democracies
EU and its candidate countries

Countries of the Western world are generally considered to share certain fundamental political ideologies, including those of liberal democracy, the rule of law, human rights and a high degree of gender equality (although there are notable exceptions, especially in foreign policy). Additionally countries with strong political and/or military ties to Western Europe, NATO and/or the United States, such as Japan, Israel, and South Korea can be said to be Western in a political sense at least.

As such, this definition of the term "Western" is not necessarily tied to the geographic sense of the word. A geographically Western nation such as Cuba is sometimes not considered politically Western due to its general rejection of liberal democracy, freedom of the press, and personal liberty. Conversely, some Eastern nations, for example, Japan, India, Israel, Taiwan, and South Korea, could be considered politically Western, due to their adoption of indigenous liberal democratic political institutions similar in structure to those of the traditionally Western nations.

Economic

World map indicating Human Development Index (2008)
0.950 and over 0.900–0.949 0.850–0.899 0.800–0.849 0.750–0.799 0.700–0.749 0.650–0.699 0.600–0.649 0.550–0.599 0.500–0.549 0.450–0.499 0.400–0.449 0.350–0.399 under 0.350 not available
(Colour-blind compliant map) For red-green color vision problems.

Though the Cold War has ended, and some members of the former Eastern Bloc are making a general movement towards liberal democracy and other values held in common by the traditionally Western states, some former Soviet republics are not considered Western because of the small presence of social and political reform, as well as their obvious cultural, economic and political differences to what is known today as described by the term "the West" (Western Europe, North America, Australia and New Zealand). These include the three Transcaucasian republics (Azerbaijan, Georgia, Armenia), as well as Kazakhstan, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan, Uzbekistan, Kyrgyzstan, Russia, Belarus and Ukraine.

Although it is inaccurate to do so, the term "Western world" is often interchangeable with the term First World stressing the difference between First World and the Third World or developing countries. The term "The North" has in some contexts replaced earlier usage of the term "the West", particularly in the critical sense, as a more robust demarcation than the terms "West" and "East". The North provides some absolute geographical indicators for the location of wealthy countries, most of which are physically situated in the Northern Hemisphere, although, as most countries are located in the northern hemisphere in general, some have considered this distinction to be equally unhelpful. The thirty countries in the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD), which include: the EU, Norway, Iceland, Switzerland, Canada, the United States, Australia, New Zealand,Taiwan, South Korea and Japan, generally include what used to be called the "first world" or the "developed world", although the OECD includes a few countries, namely Mexico and Turkey, that are not yet fully industrial countries, but newly industrialized countries. The existence of "The North" implies the existence of "The South", and the socio-economic divide between North and South. Although Israel, Singapore, Taiwan and Hong Kong are not members of the OECD, they might also be regarded as "western" or "northern" countries or regions, because their high living standards and their social, economical and political structure are quite similar to those of the OECD member countries.

Other views

A series of scholars of civilization, including Arnold J. Toynbee, Alfred Kroeber and Carroll Quigley have identified and analyzed "Western civilization" as one of the civilizations that have historically existed and still exist today. Toynbee entered into quite an expansive mode, including as candidates those countries or cultures who became so heavily influenced by the West as to adopt these borrowings into their very self-identity; carried to its limit, this would in practice include almost everyone within the West, in one way or another. In particular, Toynbee refers to the intelligentsia formed among the educated elite of countries impacted by the European expansion of centuries past. While often pointedly nationalist, these cultural and political leaders interacted within the West to such an extent as to change both themselves and the West.[20]

Huntington's map of major civilizations,[21] What constitutes Western civilization in his view is coloured dark blue. Huntington gave the most stringent interpretation of the term. It's based on culture tradition and history

Yet more recently, Samuel P. Huntington has taken a far more restricted approach, forging a political science hypothesis he labeled the "The Clash of Civilizations?" in a Foreign Affairs article and a book.[22] According to Huntington's hypothesis, what he calls "conflicts between civilizations" will be the primary tensions of the 21st century world. In this hypothesis, the West is based on religion, as the countries of Western and Central Europe were historically influenced by the two forms of Western Christianity, namely Catholicism and Protestantism. Also, many Anglophone countries share these traits, e.g. Australia and New Zealand, as well as the more heterogeneous United States and Canada. Of course, so does Latin America.[23] Huntington's thesis was/is the most influential, but was by no means universally accepted; its supporters say that it explains modern conflicts, such as those in the former Yugoslavia; the thesis' detractors fear that by equating values like democracy with the concept of "Western civilization", it reinforces stereotypes that some perceive as being common within the West about non-traditionally Western societies that some may consider racist or xenophobic; others believe that Huntington ignores the existence of non-Western democracies such as the East Asian, South-Central Asian, and Latin American democracies. As such, these detractors believe that it will serve to provoke and amplify conflict rather than illuminating a way to find an accommodating world order, or in particular cases a commonly agreed solution.

In Huntington's narrow thesis, the historically Eastern Orthodox nations of southeastern and Eastern Europe constitute a distinct "Euro-Asiatic civilization"; although European and mainly Christian (as well as notable Muslim influence and populations, particularly in the Balkans and southern/central Russia), these nations were not, in Huntington's view, shaped by the cultural influences of the Renaissance. The Renaissance did not affect Orthodox Eastern Europe due in part to the proximity of Ottoman domination; though the decisive influence on the Renaissance of Greek émigré scholars should be acknowledged.[24]

Other views might be made regarding Eastern Europe.[25]

Huntington also considered the possibility that South America is a separate civilization from the West, but also mused that it might become a third part (the first two being North America and Europe) of the West in the future.[26]

The theologian and paleontologist Pierre Teilhard de Chardin conceived of the West as the set of civilizations descended from the Nile Valley Civilization of Egypt.[27]

The term the "West" may also be used pejoratively by certain tendencies especially critical of the influence of the traditional West, due to the history of some of the members of the traditional West being previously involved, at one time or another, in outright imperialism and colonialism. Some of these critics also claim that the traditional West has continued to engage in what might be viewed as modern implementations of imperialism and colonialism, such as neoliberalism and globalization. (It should be noted that many Westerners who subscribe to a positive view of the traditional West are also very critical of neoliberalism and globalization, for their allegedly negative effects on both the developed and developing world.) Allegedly, definitions of the term "Western world" that some may consider "ethnocentric" are considered by some to be "constructed" around one or another Western culture. The British writer Rudyard Kipling wrote about this contrast: East is East and West is West and never the twain shall meet, expressing that somebody from the West can never understand the Asian cultures as the latter differ too much from the Western cultures. Some may view this alleged incompatibility as a precursor to Huntington's "clash of civilizations" theory.

Paradoxically, today Asia and Africa to varying degrees may be considered quasi-Western. Many East Asians and South Asians and Africans and others associate or even identify with the cosmopolitan cultures and international societies referred to sometimes as Western. Likewise, many in the West identify with a transcultural humanity, a notion often found in visions of the sacred.

From a very different perspective, it has also been argued that the idea of the West is, in part, a non-Western invention, deployed in the non-West to shape and define non-Western pathways through or against modernity. [28]

See also

References

  1. ^ western definition | Dictionary.com
  2. ^ Middle Ages

    Of the three great civilizations of western Eurasia and North Africa, that of Christian Europe began as the least developed in virtually all aspects of material and intellectual culture, well behind the Islamic states and Byzantium.

  3. ^ Lewis, Bernard (2002). What Went Wrong. Oxford University Press. pp. p. 3. ISBN 0-06-51605-4.

    For many centuries the world of Islam was in the forefront of human civilization and achievement…. In the era between the decline of antiquity and the dawn of modernity, that is, in the centuries designated in European history as medieval, the Islamic claim was not without justification.

  4. ^ Science, civilization and society
  5. ^ Middle Ages
  6. ^ commercial revolution
  7. ^ The Scientific Revolution
  8. ^ The Industrial Revolution - Innovations
  9. ^ Thompson, William; Joseph Hickey (2005). Society in Focus. Boston, MA: Pearson. 0-205-41365-X. Broek and Webb, A Geography of Mankind (2nd ed., 1973) at 199, 201; cf., Arnold Toynbee, Change and Habit (Oxford Univ., 1966).
  10. ^ Duran 1995, p.81
  11. ^ Charles Freeman. The Closing of the Western Mind. Knopf, 2003. ISBN 1-4000-4085-X
  12. ^ Modern Western Civ. 7: The Scientific Revolution of the 17 Cent.
  13. ^ The Industrial Revolution
  14. ^ Industrial Revolution and the Standard of Living: The Concise Encyclopedia of Economics, Library of Economics and Liberty
  15. ^ Encyclopædia Britannica's Great Inventions, Encyclopædia Britannica
  16. ^ a b "New Left Review - Jack Goody: The Labyrinth of Kinship". http://newleftreview.org/?view=2592. Retrieved on 2007-07-24.
  17. ^ Thompson, William; Joseph Hickey (2005). Society in Focus. Boston, MA: Pearson. 0-205-41365-X.
  18. ^ Embassy of Brazil - Ottawa
  19. ^ AEI - Chile Moves On
  20. ^ Cf., Arnold J. Toynbee, Change and Habit. The challenge of our time (Oxford 1966, 1969) at 153-156; also, Toynbee, A Study of History (10 volumes, 2 supplements).
  21. ^ The World of Civilizations
  22. ^ Samuel P. Huntington, The Clash of Civilizations and the Remaking of World Order (1996).
  23. ^ About Latin America Huntington was evidently ambivalent; see text at next after paragraph.
  24. ^ Scholars such as Georgios Gemistos Plethon, Manuel Chrysoloras, Theodorus of Gaza, Ioannis Argyropoulos, Markos Mousouros and Demetrius Chalcondyles.
  25. ^ The Renaissance was said to be weak in the frontier region of Hungary because Ottoman military pressure long limited Hungarian access to their fellow Roman Catholics in Austria. Yet regarding Hungary, such views wander away from the consensus. Some claim the reforms of Peter the Great (1682-1725) and Catherine II the Great (1762-96) were inspired by the Enlightenment. However, they departed considerably from the Enlightenment idea of respect for the individual: Peter's projects for St Petersburg cost the lives of 30,000 workers (though such loss of life was not unknown in Western Europe), and under both Peter and Catherine most Russians remained serfs. It is unclear whether these views are those of Huntington or not.
  26. ^ Huntington evidently did not detail Australia and New Zealand, but see map.
  27. ^ Cf., Teilhard de Chardin, Le Phenomene Humain (1955), translated as The Phenomena of Man (New York 1959).
  28. ^ Bonnett, A. 2004. The Idea of the West
Cultural Macro-Regions and their sub-entities
Western world Western Europe · Central and Eastern Europe · North America · Latin America · Australia · New Zealand
Latin America Central America · Caribbean · South America
Arab world North Africa · Western Asia
Sinosphere Mainland China · Taiwan · Japan · Korea · Vietnam · Mongolia · Singapore ·
Greater India Indian Subcontinent · Indochina
Turkic peoples Eastern Europe · Central Asia · Southern Europe · Turkey
Hellenistic world Eastern Europe · Southern Europe · Anatolia · Southwest Asia · Middle East · Mediterranean · Magna Graecia · Egypt · Greece · Cyprus
Austronesia Taiwan · Malay Archipelago · Melanesia · Micronesia · Polynesia · Madagascar · Hawaii
Aboriginal Australia Australian Aborigines · Tasmanian Aborigines · Victorian Aborigines ·
Indigenous Culture of the Americas Bolivia · Guatemala · Mexico · Paraguay · Peru · Canadian Aborigines · Native Americans · Native Alaskans · Inuit · Mapuche
Iranian World Greater Iran · Iran · Central Asia · The Caucasus · Kurdistan · Afghanistan · Pakistan · Tajikistan · Republic of Azerbaijan · Uzbekistan · Zazas · Mishmahig
Bantu peoples Southern Africa · Congo River · Equatorial Guinea · Kenya · Tanzania · Uganda · Rwanda · Burundi · Gabon · Cameroon · Nigeria
Unaffiliated Israel
See also: List of civilizations Clash of Civilizations · World history

Categories: Country classifications | Cultural spheres of influence

 

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