Alan Macfarlane: ‘If the essence of modernity is the separation and tension between the contrary demands of politics, religion, economy and society, it is the legal system which holds them in balance – and which underpins them all. It is difficult to conceive of a game of football or cricket without rules, referee or umpire. ‘

Spring-Summer Serial 2012. Chapter 9: CIVIL SOCIETY  By Alan Macfarlane. THE ESSENCE OF modernity is the elimination of all three traditional means of enforcing co-operation – kinship, an absolutist State and an absolutist Church.  Yet modern societies, if anything, need more self-sacrifice of the individual for the general good than ever. How can this be […]

Alan Macfarlane: One sign of ‘modernity’ is the importance of competitive games and sports. Here we find one of the earliest and most important of British exports, including the games which can claim to be the new world religion – cricket and football. India is united by cricket, and Brazil by football…Playing games of all kinds was a hugely important and old phenomenon in Britain – we see it in art, literature and other sources from the Middle Ages. To a very considerable extent, the ‘imagined Empire’ of Britain was held together by games.

Spring-Summer Serial 2012. Chapter 2: WAR, TRADE AND EMPIRE By Alan Macfarlane. WE START WITH brute force. The energy which projected what I shall argue was an unusual and early modernity through the world came through political, economic and imperial domination.  For most of the most influential period of British history, the ‘long’ nineteenth century […]

Alan Macfarlane: ‘This is a book which synthesizes a lifetime of reflection on the origins of the modern world. Through forty years of travel in Europe, Australia, India, Nepal, Japan and China I have observed the similarities and differences of cultures. I have read as widely as possible in both contemporary and classical works in history, anthropology and philosophy.’