The World That Trade Created: Society, Culture, And the World Economy, 1400 to the Present (Sources and Studies in World History) | 
| Authors: Kenneth Pomeranz, Steven Topik
Publisher: M.E. Sharpe
Category: Book
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Avg. Customer Rating:  16 reviews
Sales Rank: 5786
Media: Paperback
Edition: 2
Number Of Items: 1
Pages: 287
Shipping Weight (lbs): 0.8
Dimensions (in): 8.9 x 6 x 0.9
ISBN: 0765617099
Dewey Decimal Number: 382.09
EAN: 9780765617095
ASIN: 0765617099
Publication Date: October 31, 2005
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| Customer Reviews: Read 11 more reviews...
 Overrated and full of hyperbole July 31, 2007
5 out of 9 found this review helpful
The authors have written a book with a clear-cut agenda--to force American students to recognize and overcome their evil "Eurocentric" biases. (The word "Eurocentric" too often today is code for racist.) While I do agree that there are other histories, other perspectives, trashing Europe, Europeans, and by extension Americans, to build up an argument for knowing about the Chinese, Aztecs, and Africans fails to impress. This book is the textual equivalent of shouting the loudest to gain the greatest attention, and that very hyperbole makes for a very bad book, both from reading and teaching perspectives. Furthermore, Pomeranz, who studies China, seems to be under the impression he's the only one who knows anything about China and the rest of us are totally ignorant on the subject. Anybody who has read ANY Jonathan Spence or Patricia Ebrey or John King Fairbank knows better--in every sense of that world. For India, read PJ Marshall, Barbara Stoller, or Richard Barnett; Africa, John Thorton and Linda Heywood, Philip Curtain, or David Northrup. Frankly, THE WORLD THAT TRADE CREATED is a polemic, not a history. One would more profitably spend time with Curtain's THE WEST AND THE WORLD.
The world that Pommeranz and Topik invent May 6, 2007
6 out of 11 found this review helpful
Fun reading for those that enjoy economic history. The problem is that it is impossible to know what is real.
For example, when talking about the euro, they say that by 2003 "pesos, francs, and marks had become things of the past." That is, Messrs. Pommeranz and Topik confuse pesos (used in several Latin American countries) with pesetas (the vanished Spanish currency). A superficial mistake, no doubt, but one that any well-informed student would avoid making. One can only wonder about the world the authors invent, or get superficially or deeply wrong, when they travel further into the past.
fast and loose with the facts April 1, 2007
8 out of 10 found this review helpful
Written by college professors, "The World that Trade Created" tries to sound like a textbook, but is in reality a fictionalized novel that uses history as its vehicle.
Warning sign: there are no footnotes. The book contains thousands of quotes and factoids, but the authors give no indication where they came from. This intellectually dishonest technique keeps the reader from determining for themselves whether the "facts" presented are reliable, unreliable, or made up.
Yes, sometimes stuff is simply made up. Example: "Remote Andorra is now in the center of the world." (p.214) This is just nonsense masquerading as fact. I could find no similar description of Andorra anywhere else. Every other account I found calls Andorra "remote", the opposite of central. Andorra is not alone in offering tax advantages or relying on tourism, so it cannot be central metaphorically. Here and elsewhere, the authors simply make a fanciful statement as if it were fact.
"The World That Trade Created" is at best a loosely organized, fictionalized version of trade history. If you want a revisionist view of history told in People Magazine format, this is the book for you.
only a stiff could possibly find this book remotely interesting February 21, 2006
4 out of 41 found this review helpful
After reading this book and writing this review, I considered reporting it to the U.S Consumer Product Safety Commision, because this book is dangerously boring! I found no new information relevent to anything important. In addition, I believed that certain parts were extremely repetitive, and the topics were dull. The AP teachers may find this book interesting, however, they obviously do not care how their students will react to reading such a dry group of essays. I would highly not recommend this book to anyone, and if you do have to read it for AP World History, good luck.
 Anxious February 18, 2006
1 out of 29 found this review helpful
Reading this book just makes me exremely anxious... I don't know why.. Maybe its because it just talks about a bunch of stuff that I'm already aware of.. i would rather opt for an interesting story that shows this rather than a bunch of essays. However, if you're into trade and want to sharpen up your knowledge on it, this book is for you.
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