Eurocentrism: definition and history

Greek mythology says that Europa was a Phoenician princess who was kidnapped by Zeus and transferred to Crete. Even in the myth, we observe the link that has always existed between Europe and Asia; a link that goes further, since, geographically speaking, Europe is not a continent, but a part of Asia.

It is clear, then, that the differentiation of Europe as a continent is due more to cultural than geographical elements. However, even this differentiation contains its weak points, since, throughout history, the various cultural realities have coexisted and influenced each other. Why, then, consider Europe as the central axis of the entire historical process?

In this article we are going to analyze the concept of Eurocentrism: we will specify its meaning and give a brief overview of its origins.

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Eurocentrism: definition and key concepts

Eurocentrism can be defined as the position that places the European continent and its culture as the center of human civilization

. This Eurocentric perspective occurs both at a historical, economic or social level; In all cases, Europe is established as the central axis from which the rest of the world revolves.

Eurocentrism is a form of ethnocentrism. And what is ethnocentrism? It is the vision of an ethnic group, culture or society that places itself as a center from which to interpret and judge the rest of the cultures, ethnic groups and societies. This perspective entails, in general, an attitude of superiority towards the rest.

It is important to note that, despite the fact that all cultures are, to a greater or lesser degree, ethnocentric, European ethnocentrism has been the only one that, historically, has identified itself as a universality, that is, as a guideline to follow for the rest of the world. world. In all of this, as we will see, the creation and establishment of capitalism has had a lot to do with it. But let's go in parts.

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Eurocentrism and the “universal model of development”

Eurocentrism is, then, a way of universalization. As Samir Amin states in his book Eurocentrism. critique of an ideology, this ethnocentric vision of Europe "proposes everyone to imitate the Western model as the only solution to the challenges of time." In other words, according to the Eurocentric concept, only through the European model can the rest of the world's societies adapt and advance. In this way, the myth of a "redemptive" Europe, paternalistic, whose only intention is to "save" the rest of the cultures from their "barbarism" is built.

Samir Amin, in the aforementioned book, emphasizes that the roots of this European universalist concept lie in the Renaissance of the fifteenth century. Later, during the 19th century, the concept is massively spread. Both historical moments coincide with European colonialist expansions, either European colonialism towards America in the 15th century or European colonialism in Africa, which occupied the entire 19th century and part of the 20th.

These colonialisms exported the idea of ​​“higher culture”, and they tried to assimilate the autochthonous cultural realities with the European ones. Thus, according to Amin, the birth of Eurocentrism coincides with the birth of the modern capitalist world, which the author places in the 15th century. On the other hand, its peak coincides with the explosion of capitalism in the world, in the middle of the colonial era.

This theory contains several errors. To begin with, it is inaccurate to call fifteenth-century European society capitalist, since we can at best refer to it as a mercantilist society. In no way can the fifteenth century be identified with capitalism or, at least, it is not the same capitalism than the one that prevailed from the 18th century and that coincides, effectively, with colonialism 19th century European However, it is true that, prior to the fifteenth century, we do not find a solidly constructed Eurocentric discourse.

Eurocentrism asserts its supposed superiority based on several aspects. First, the claim that capitalism is the evolutionary apex of societies and which is, according to this theory, the best way to build a society. And the second, the presumption of a historical continuity that, according to Samir Amin, is non-existent.

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The Enlightenment and the "invention" of European history

Indeed, Eurocentrism draws an evolutionary line that goes from Greek and Roman antiquity to the present day. And, as Samir Amin, Enrique Dussel and other authors point out, this line is completely artificial and imposed. Let's see it next.

For a start, the Europe of antiquity does not correspond to the Europe of today. What was later established as the "only Europe" was, in Greek and Roman times, barbaric and "uncivilized" territory. The cultures that shone in antiquity were the Egyptian and the cultures of the Near East, such as the Persian or the Babylonian. The Greeks admired these Eastern cultures, and did not consider them "barbaric" cultures, as they did call the cultures of the rest of Europe. Therefore, first point: what after the 18th century was called Europe and was considered a model of civilization, at first it was considered as the periphery of the ancient cultural center.

What do we mean by this? Simply, that the construction of Europe as a civilizing axis is a myth that was born in the Enlightenment. This axis did not exist as such in antiquity. The cultural center of antiquity passed through Egypt and the Near East, not through what we today consider Europe. However, the European historical discourse has traditionally introduced these cultures in its evolutionary line, thus establishing a Mesopotamia-Egypt-Greece-Rome-Europe axis that is completely artificial, with the sole intention of including these civilizations as part of European history.

Furthermore, prior to this European universalist discourse, there was no "universal history." Each region, each geographical reality had its own history and evolution. Thus we found a multiplicity of cultural realities that simply coexisted with each other and, yes, influenced each other. But in no case can we talk about a common history.

Therefore, we can conclude that it was the European need to build a history that facilitated the emergence of this "universal history", which has monopolized textbooks for centuries. A "universal history" that, in reality, has very little universality.

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European culture is not a single bloc

The aforementioned Enrique Dussel, in his work Europe, modernity and eurocentrism, defends with arguments this idea of ​​the invention of the linear history of Europe. Dussel demonstrates that what has traditionally been seen as the "opposite" of Europe (that is, all what was not Greco-Roman culture and Christianity) is actually a complement, not an opposition. Let's take a closer look at it.

Traditionally, European culture has been seen as a fusion between Greco-Roman culture and Christianity. Based on this definition, everything that does not fit these characteristics has tended to be "removed" from the European reality.

Dussel cites the Muslim world and the Byzantine Orient as clear examples. The latter, despite obviously being based on classical culture and Christianity, has been separating from what has traditionally been called Europe.

However, the reality is very different. The Muslim Arab world, for example, drank from classical philosophy. In fact, the work of many of the Greek thinkers, such as Aristotle, reached Europe thanks to the Muslim conquests. On the other hand, and as we have already commented, the Byzantine world was heir to the Roman world; in fact, they called themselves “Romans”, not Byzantines.

What does all this mean? That the European cultural uniformity, circumscribed to the geographical area that we know today and that would coincide, more or less, with the European Union, it is an idea that does not fully correspond to the reality. Therefore, and following Dussel again, it is only from the 18th century, with the Enlightenment (and, above all, with German Romanticism) that Hellenistic culture is “kidnapped” and labeled as uniquely European. We have already seen how this is not the case, since worlds far from what we now call Europe, such as the Arab world and the Byzantine world, also drank from Greek culture.

Eurocentrism and historical “stageism”

We have already said that every culture is, to some extent, ethnocentric, which means situating its own cultural reality as a place from which to analyze, interpret and often judge the rest of cultures. It is what are called "peripheral cultures", that is, the realities that are beyond the culture itself, which is situated as the central axis.

We have also commented that in the case of Europe, this ethnocentrism is the only one that is identified with universality. We have, then, the European culture (self) considered as the model to follow, an idea promoted by the rise of colonialism and capitalism. It is this supposed European cultural "superiority" that believes it justifies this colonialism, taking refuge in a paternalism fictitious that considers other peoples as underdeveloped, primitive realities and, therefore, in need of protection. In other words: the justification for colonialism and the atrocities that are related to it is a "civilizing" intention, a desire to mark the "correct" path for other peoples.

From this idea of ​​Europe as a model of civilization, the concept called “stageism” appears, which of him conceives the historical process as a succession of stages. Karl Marx picks it up in his Foreword to A Contribution to the Critique of Political Economy (1858), where he expresses that: "Broadly speaking, we can designate as so many times of progress, in which economic formation of society, the Asiatic, ancient, feudal and modern mode of production bourgeois". Thus, based on this Marxist concept, the progress of history is linear, and culminates in socialism, which would come after capitalism (which he calls the "bourgeois mode of production"). This concept is nothing more than another Eurocentric vision of history, since it establishes the evolution of societies based on this "invented history" that takes Europe as its central axis. What happens, then, with the economic and cultural realities of other geographical points? Where is imperial China, or pre-Columbian America, in all this process?

conclusions

Thus, as a conclusion we can affirm that: first, the so-called "universal history" is not really, since it has as its central axis only the European reality, around which the so-called peripheral cultures “revolve”. We can verify this immediately if we analyze the nomenclature of the different historical periods, which take, without exception, the European reality as a reference.

For example, can you talk about the Middle Ages in China, or in India? Strictly, of course not, since the beginning of the Middle Ages has been established (also quite arbitrary) with the fall of the Roman Empire, and both China and India have little or nothing to do with this event historical.

Second, what what has been considered European history does not exactly coincide with reality either, since, as we have verified, from the Enlightenment a linear history was "forced" that encompasses cultures that are not properly European, such as the Egyptian or the Mesopotamian.

Third, that the cultural realities that have traditionally been considered "non-European" (namely, the Muslim Arab world or the Byzantine world) also drink from classical culture, which makes us ask ourselves the following question: where does it begin and where does it end? Europe?

Finally, Eurocentrism is based, above all, on an economic element, since it is from Eurocentrism that Europe has justified its domination of other cultural realities and has expanded the capitalist system. At this point, we see that phenomena such as globalization, which seems so natural to us today, also arise from this Eurocentric (and economic) perspective of the world.

Fortunately, little by little in academic circles this linear progression that emerges from Eurocentrism is being overcome. In recent years, a significant change has been observed in subjects such as history or art, and works are appearing (not without difficulty) that present the history and artistic creation from the points of view of what, in the past, were considered the "peripheral cultures" of Europe.