Talk:Clash of Civilizations/Archive 2

The Entire Map is laughable and the clash of civilization idea is simply absurd

 * Protestants + Catholic = western civilization? what?
 * Portraying most of Eastern Europe as an Orthodox civilization is laughable.
 * All of the Islamic nations lumped together…even though they have almost nothing in common.
 * Korea and Vietnam are lumped with China but Tibet (a freking territory within China) and Mongolia aren't? And Japanese being considered a separate civilization from the Confucian sinosphere, while Korea and Vietnam are not...???
 * Lumps all of South and southern Sub Sahara Africa as "African civilization" yet all of north and northern sub Sahara Africa is Islamic civilization? What exactly is African civilization?
 * The map lumps everything south of Texas as Latin American civilization, even though South America is incredibly diverse and some of them speak Portuguese instead of Spanish...

The map and perhaps the entire idea in general is ridiculous... Intranetusa (talk) 06:03, 5 May 2009 (UTC)


 * Interesting, but this article isn't really about your personal opinion. Please provide scholarly sources. 188.113.121.47 (talk) 21:41, 16 May 2010 (UTC)


 * Is this article about the book, or about the article (which had the title "A Clash of Civilizations?" of a question). At the moment it seems to be about "the theory" termed "COC". In that case facts underlying this theory should be in the article, and there is certainly room for "criticism of the theory" in the article itself. The biggest danger probably lies in "half-knowledge" and "half-arsism" of the people who love to pick oversimplified theories and run around the block with them. For the good of the Wikipedia, the article should be about the book by Huntington and not about "the theory". User:ScotXW t@lk 13:12, 25 December 2015 (UTC)


 * Regarding the primordial article in Foreign Affairs journal, the title is supposed to be provocative, given that Huntington was a teacher, not a policy maker. It is also more of an answer to a possibly underlying pattern of future wars/disputes after the end of the cold war. Wikipedia should constraint itself to providing an article about the book or about the article and NOT about the oversimplified and provocative "theory". User:ScotXW t@lk 13:37, 25 December 2015 (UTC)


 * "Wikipedia should constraint itself to providing an article about the book or about the article and NOT about the oversimplified and provocative "theory"." - i am very much in disagreement with this point. turning a blind eye to the existence of this "oversimplified and provocative " would be in my opinion like insisting that there should be only articles on the Bible, and the Koran and NOT about christianity and islam.
 * And besides, Huntingtons original work can be seen as mightily contributing to the rise of this "oversimplified and provocative " and shaping it.
 * Actually in my opinion the criticism section is very much in need of touching on how such a crude ideology (i mean Huntingtons work) achieved such remarkable memetic success exactly because of being an "oversimplified and provocative " and working well as an ideological catalisator in the mobilisation of our societies in what could be likened to a modern crusade as opposed to a scientifically strict analysis which it is not and seemingly never meant to be. 176.63.176.112 (talk) 11:07, 13 May 2017 (UTC).

'When a civilization is dying, political respect is not given to the man with the shrewdest diagnosis, but to the one with the most impressive bedside manner.' [Eric Ambler]] Crawiki (talk) 16:32, 14 November 2017 (UTC) Crawiki (talk) 16:32, 14 November 2017 (UTC)

Make that Eric Ambler. Damn keypad too small, fingers too big Crawiki (talk) 16:33, 14 November 2017 (UTC) Crawiki (talk) 16:33, 14 November 2017 (UTC)

It's not the clash of civilizations, it is rather "the clash of power-hungry men".
98.246.42.130 (talk) 16:19, 5 February 2010 (UTC)I read Huntington’s book in the mid nineties and thought that maybe he was on the wrong path. Did he miss the bigger picture? Do men's conflicts with other men stem from their cultural differences or do they stem from the need of the ruling class to create real or imaginary enemies for their tribes to gain, maintain, consolidate and use power for their own benefit? The dark shadow of the power-hungry men is lurking above every small tribal fight or national and inter-continental wars. It is still the exact same formula: Us against them. Good against evil. The formula is as old as the man himself.

Thanks for the Marxist tip! :) Semmler (talk) 06:11, 23 May 2010 (UTC)


 * The true clash of all time (past, present and future) is wealth vs poverty ("haves" vs "have nots"). Its nothing new or innovative. Religion and politics are merely tools used to justify the unforgiving and relentless greed of man. The wealthy will continue to oppress the poor and middle/working class, and the poor will periodically revolt or terrorise (depending on whether the tool is political or religious). — Preceding unsigned comment added by 203.129.23.146 (talk) 10:29, 23 September 2011 (UTC)

The whole book is an oxymoron. Civilised people don't 'clash'. Crawiki (talk) 16:37, 14 November 2017 (UTC) Crawiki (talk) 16:37, 14 November 2017 (UTC)

Map Issue - Ethiopia and Haiti
The map lists Ethiopia as African and Haiti as Latin American. However, as the article states, Huntington considered them to be "lone countries", countries that did not belong to a larger civilization or society because of unique history. Ethiopia, until the twentieth century, was ruled by emperors tracing their descent from King Solomon. It is not important whether that descent is authentic, because it is part of the national mythos, but the history of Ethiopia dates back to ancient times. Haiti is the subject of a historical tragedy, in that it was the place of the only successful slave revolution in recorded history, but the educated classes fled to France and the United States, leaving Haiti in ignorance and anarchy. The slaves got their freedom, but at a terrible cost. Haiti does not have much common history with the rest of the Caribbean, and Ethiopia has its own history that is separate from both North Africa (Islamic) and sub-Saharan Africa.

It doesn't matter whether individual editors agree with that characterization, because the map represents the views of Huntington. The map should be corrected.

Robert McClenon (talk) 04:18, 30 August 2018 (UTC)