History and the Present

Throughout the book, the author anchors his considerations of the early twenty-first century and beyond in considerations of the decades, centuries, and millennia that have gone before. This essential perspective appears in every chapter/essay in the book, as he considers the experiences of both individuals and communities in terms of how individuals and communities have gone through similar experiences in the past. For example, his considerations of nationalism in Chapter 7 and throughout the book are developed not only in relation to the twenty-first century nationalisms of “Britons, Americans, Russians, and numerous other groups” (110) but the World War II-era nationalisms of Nazi Germany. In another example, his consideration of the role of religion in twenty-first century life is considered in relation to the role of religion in Japanese life, locally and internationally, in the mid-1850’s.

In deploying considerations of history as part of his...