The World: A Beginners Guide

What is the world of the 21st century like now that the centrality of the West is no longer given? How were the societies and cultures of todays world together with their interconnections forged, and what is driving human society in our times? In short, what is the state of the world today as we enter the second decade of the 21st century?This is the first book which deals with planetary human society as whole. It is a beginners guide to the world after the West and after globalization, compact, portable, and jargonfree. It is aimed at everybody who, even with experience, has kept a beginners curiosity of the world, to everybody who does not know everything they want to know about it, about the good, the evil, and the salvation of the world. It lays bare the sociocultural geology of the world, its major civilizations, its historical waves of globalization, its familysexgender systems, and its pathways to modernity. It outlines the dynamics of the world, its basic drives, the contours of its most important global and subglobal processes. It presents the big team players on the world stage, populous as well as rich countries, missions and movements as well corporations and cities. It traces the lifecourses of men and women on all the continents, from their birth and childhood to their old age, and their funeral.