On Belonging to Western Civilization

A day when America’s Federal Reserve has apparently decided to play John J. Pershing to the latest European crisis seems like as good a time as any to talk about that old warhorse, Western civilization — and particularly the debates kicked up by “Civilization: The West and the Rest,” Niall Ferguson’s latest tome. Though perhaps “debates” is too high-minded a word, since the most prominent argument has featured Pankaj Mishra accusing Ferguson (in a vituperous London Review of Books review) of being a neo-imperialist, “white’s man burden”-toting Euro-chauvinist, followed by Ferguson threatening to sue Mishra for libel.