Global History—Challenges and Constraints

July/August 2004 · Historically Speaking Mazlish: I think they do persist because human beings are desperate to make sense out of things. I tend to operate on a more modest and empirical level. Yerxa: What do you see as the relationship between the various levels of historical inquiry? Mazlish: I believe that you cannot do good local history anymore without paying attention to the interaction with the global. And vice versa. It's all connected. So if you are studying a small town in upstate New York, and you find that in the past there was an increase in unemployment, you might look to where else in America the jobs went. Nowadays, you have to look at the global context ofsuch things. You cannot separate the local from the national from the global. Yerxa: Are historians asking the right questions ? Mazlish: The first thing that must be said is that there is some wonderfully creative work going on in history. But we still have a long way to go, and in part this is afunction ofthe way the field has been institutionalized. While our world has changed, historians haven't absorbed that fact. The nation-state has been the main orientation ofhistorians; the training of historians and the resources committed to history still reflect this. So many ofthe things that concern us today—the environment , currencies, jobs, etc.—are global, and we don't have the analytic categories to understand these. How do you make the jump, especially when the profession still rewards the monograph based on archival material? To be sure, the monograph is the bedrock of historical inquiry, but we need to redefine what we mean by an archive nowadays. What makes history so fascinating to me is that it is telling us who we are, what we are, what we have been, and where we are going. I may overstate my case here, but I think it is wrong to write a monograph without asking where it all fits into answering the so-called large questions. We all like a good story, but that seems like a secondary assignment for the historian. Having said this, I must assert that I do not believe in teleology, that history is heading in a particular direction. On the other hand, we do have a responsibility to identify the large currents that are swirling toward a particular outcome , globalization being one ofthem. Yerxa: On a personal level, what has the study ofhistory meant to you? Mazlish: It has given me a sense ofmeaning, ofwhat it is to be a human being. It situates me. I am different from, say, Voltaire in the 18th century, and yet as a human being I share many things with him as well. At another level, since I don't have a religious view ofimmortality, I derive meaning from history. I know I am going to die one day, but my life has meaning because it joins with that ofall my fellow humans. Yerxa: Any final thoughts? Mazlish: This probably should be offthe record, but this interview has given me the opportunity to pull together so much ofmy work. I am aware that that work is often seen as a collection ofdisparate pieces: psychohistory, the history ofthe social sciences, new global history, etc. But I don't see it in that way. My work has been unified around a number of related questions, and I am grateful for the opportunity to express this conviction. Global History—Challenges and Constraints Dominic Sachsenmaier Duringthe past decade, debates on how to internationalize or even globalize historiographyhave gained momentum in Europe and particularlyin the United States. Clearly global, international, and transcultural issues have moved closer to the historical community's center ofattention, and the push to do so comes from different directions . First, there is a reform movement within previously established—yet until recentlysomewhatmarginalized—fields such as world history, international history, and diplomatichistory. Partlyinspired byresearch approaches in other social sciences, these fields recognize the need to develop new paradigms and methodologies. Second, there are new field designations that seek to develop a more encompassing understanding of the past. One ofthem is global history. Global historyhas quicklyrisen to prominence in recentyears...