Jared Diamond - Diamond Theory

Writing Assignment 1

        Jared Diamond is an anthropologist who seeks to explain why some countries are wealthier than other. In his theory, Diamond attributes societal success to geography and environment which he argues are the most important factors in shaping the modern world. To define differences between developing cultures, he emphasizes the effects of food production, germs and immunity, and the discovery and use of steel.

        In both his book and documentary, Diamond argues the importance of the development of food production. He suggests that societies be come more stable when they abandon the nomadic lifestyle of hunter gatherers, and begin to form permanent settlements. According to Diamond, there are several factors that are necessary for this transition to occur such as: crops that can easily be stored, a climate that will allow for such storage, and access to animals that can easily be domesticated. This would lead to a surplus of food, and people began to divide up the labor, which gave people more free time to learn other activities. Populations begin to thrive under these new conditions and empires arise. Diamond argues that this is all by geographic chance and not anything in the nature of the people.

Another point in Diamonds argument is germs and immunity. When Europe began to colonize the Americas, they brought over diseases that killed many of the people indigenous to these areas. Diamond suggests that because the indigenous people, had not been in close proximity to domesticated animals and their animal diseases, they were not able to build up an immunity to them through natural selection. So essentially, societies with climates that were not suitable for domesticating animals, were not as successful because they weren’t able to build up strong immune systems leaving them very vulnerable.

        In contrast to Diamonds explanation of why some societies are successful, Daron Acemoglu and James Robinson argue that it in fact has nothing to do with geography. In their critique of Diamond, they state that his theory, has too many exceptions and use the example of how at one point the tropics, were much wealthier than Europe. They suggest that it is economic and political institutions that underlie a state’s economic success. In their argument, developed countries are wealthy because of inclusive behavior. This means that states invest in the countries they are colonizing. In countries that were settled by Europeans, rather than governed from a far, had better institutions in place which later lead to economic success. These “settlement colonies” established representative assemblies, lobbied imperial government for equal treatment, and had independent judiciary and civil liberties.