S. A. M. Adshead on China, World Institutions, and World History

In a series of monographs published between 1998 and 2004, S. A. M. Adshead argued that the proper concern of world history is the study of world institutions. These works included China in World History (1988), Salt and Civilization (1992), Central Asia in World History (1993), Material Culture in Europe and China, 1400–1800 (1997), and T’ang China (2004). Adshead had wanted to call his last book “The Rise of the East: An Argument in World History,” a title that better reflected its purpose. Rather than a history of the Tang dynasty, it was first and foremost an argument in world history. In this book he elaborated further the theme he had developed in the earlier works, that the defining characteristic of world history is the development and expansion of world institutions. Just what he meant by that claim, and how he developed his arguments in favor of such a view of world history, is the subject of this article.