Kenneth Pomeranz Books
Kenneth Pomeranz is an American historian and professor at the University of Chicago, specializing in Chinese history, comparative economic history, and world history. His research focuses on the economic and environmental transformations that shaped the modern world, and he is a leading figure in the field of global history.
Known for: The Great Divergence: China, Europe, and the Making of the Modern World Economy, The World That Trade Created: Society, Culture, and the World Economy, 1400 to the Present
Books by Kenneth Pomeranz
The Great Divergence: China, Europe, and the Making of the Modern World Economy
This influential work by historian Kenneth Pomeranz examines why industrialization and sustained economic growth first occurred in Western Europe rather than in other advanced regions such as China. P...
The World That Trade Created: Society, Culture, and the World Economy, 1400 to the Present
This book explores how global trade shaped societies and cultures from 1400 to the present. Through a series of concise, engaging essays, Kenneth Pomeranz and Steven Topik examine the social and cultu...
Key Insights from Kenneth Pomeranz
Comparative Framework
From the outset, my approach departs from the older Eurocentric narratives. I adopt a rigorously comparative framework, placing Western Europe and East Asia—especially the Yangzi Delta—side by side. Each possessed dense populations, commercial agriculture, sophisticated markets, and an advanced divi...
From The Great Divergence: China, Europe, and the Making of the Modern World Economy
Preindustrial Similarities
A central thrust of my argument lies in demonstrating that early modern China was not stagnant or antimodern but technologically and economically comparable to Europe. The lower Yangzi region, sometimes called China’s 'core,' exhibited high agricultural yields, intensive land use, and thriving handi...
From The Great Divergence: China, Europe, and the Making of the Modern World Economy
Early Global Exchanges (1400–1600)
In these early centuries, global trade began to take recognizable shape as the great voyages of discovery opened new routes of connection. Prior to the sixteenth century, economic life was highly regional, but long-distance networks already linked parts of Asia, Africa, and Europe through spice rout...
From The World That Trade Created: Society, Culture, and the World Economy, 1400 to the Present
The Role of Silver and Global Monetary Flows
Few commodities tell the story of early modern globalization as vividly as silver. Our book traces how the mines of Potosí in present-day Bolivia and Zacatecas in Mexico produced vast quantities of silver that flowed outward through Spanish fleets, crossing both the Atlantic and Pacific Oceans. The ...
From The World That Trade Created: Society, Culture, and the World Economy, 1400 to the Present
About Kenneth Pomeranz
Kenneth Pomeranz is an American historian and professor at the University of Chicago, specializing in Chinese history, comparative economic history, and world history. His research focuses on the economic and environmental transformations that shaped the modern world, and he is a leading figure in t...
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Kenneth Pomeranz is an American historian and professor at the University of Chicago, specializing in Chinese history, comparative economic history, and world history. His research focuses on the economic and environmental transformations that shaped the modern world, and he is a leading figure in t...
Kenneth Pomeranz is an American historian and professor at the University of Chicago, specializing in Chinese history, comparative economic history, and world history. His research focuses on the economic and environmental transformations that shaped the modern world, and he is a leading figure in the field of global history.
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Kenneth Pomeranz is an American historian and professor at the University of Chicago, specializing in Chinese history, comparative economic history, and world history. His research focuses on the economic and environmental transformations that shaped the modern world, and he is a leading figure in the field of global history.
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