The Transformation of the World: A Global History of the Nineteenth Century
At the end of the book, Osterhammel wraps up with a list of five characteristics of the nineteenth century and supports them with brief commentary. The century was an “age of asymmetrical efficiency growth,” as reflected in growing productivity, the opening of new frontiers, and the increased efficiency of armed forces. Mobility, the second characteristic, grew in scale, in the technical innovations supporting migration, and the infrastructure supporting migration. Third was the “tendency to asymmetrical reference density,” the flow of ideas and cultural content, through which both the West and the East learned much about each other. The tension between equality and hierarchy centered on the expanding recognition of legal equality in Europe, and on its tension with hierarchies in other parts of the world and the new hierarchy of great powers. Fifth, this was “a century of emancipation,” in which numerous emancipation projects advanced, but in which imperialism and colonialism stunted its expansion."