Series: Columbia Studies in International and Global History

In the Seven Years' War (1756-1763), two European rivalries—between England and France and between Prussia and Austria—collided to spark a global conflagration. In the United States, it is known as the French and Indian War, a precursor to the Revolutionary War. In India, by contrast, it marked a new stage on the path toward British colonial rule. The war saw...

Sweet potatoes were among the American crops Christopher Columbus brought back to Europe—where they were thought to be an aphrodisiac. In China, this versatile root became a staple that fueled rapid population growth. Introduced to Japan to stave off famine, sweet potatoes later sustained the country's imperial expansion. Because this hardy plant can thrive in almost any soil, it has...

In nineteenth-century Europe and North America, an organized vegetarian movement began warning of the health risks and ethical problems of meat eating. Presenting a vegetarian diet as a cure for the social ills brought on by industrialization and urbanization, this movement idealized South Asia as a model. In colonial India, where diets were far more varied than Western admirers realized,...

The post–World War II period is typically seen as a time of stark division, an epochal global conflict between the United States and the Soviet Union. However, beneath the surface, the postwar era witnessed a striking degree of international cooperation. The United Nations and its agencies, as well as regional organizations, international nongovernmental organizations, and private foundations brought together actors...

Postwar multilateral cooperation is often viewed as an attempt to overcome the limitations of the nation-state system. However, in 1945, when the United Nations was founded, large parts of the world were still under imperial control. Building States investigates how the UN tried to manage the dissolution of European empires in the 1950s and 1960s—and helped transform the practice of...

The political thought of Muslim societies is all too often defined in religious terms, in which the writings of clerics are seen as representative and ideas about governance are treated as an extension of commentary on sacred texts. Disenchanting the Caliphate offers a groundbreaking new account of political discourse in Islamic history by examining Abbasid imperial practice, illuminating the emergence...

Nationality is the most important legal mechanism sorting and classifying the world's population today. An individual's place of birth or naturalisation determines where he or she can and cannot be and what he or she can and cannot do. Although this system may appear universal, even natural, Will Hanley shows that it arose just a century ago. In Identifying with...

In the decades after World War II, the United Nations established a global refugee regime that became central to the lives of displaced people around the world. This regime has exerted particular authority over Palestinian refugees, who are served by a specialised UN body, the Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA). Formed shortly after the 1948 war, UNRWA continues to provide...

An imam banished from eastern Indonesia to the Cape of Good Hope in 1780 builds a new Muslim community with a mix of fellow exiles, enslaved people, and even the men tasked with supervising his detention. Nineteenth-century colonial chroniclers invent the legend of the "loyal Malay" warrior, whose anger can be tamed through the "mildness" of British rule. A Tunisian-born...

At the turn of the twentieth century, the city of Tianjin was the diplomatic capital of the Middle Kingdom, where foreign consuls met Chinese dignitaries, and a hub of commerce and culture. Yet in the eyes of foreigners, the city remained provincial. After the tumult of the Boxer Rebellion, however, Tianjin transformed, when a little-known international political project turned it...

The early sixteenth century saw the rise of two Mediterranean empires—the Christian Habsburgs, based in Spain and Austria, and the Muslim Ottomans, centred in the Balkans and Anatolia—with strikingly similar ambitions. Holy Roman Emperor Charles V (1500–1558) and Sultan Süleyman (1495–1566) each pursued grand universalist visions, seeking to unite Islam and Christendom under a universal monarchy that would resolve wars...

The 2006 United Nations Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities differs markedly from other forms of international human rights law: it not only protects the rights of individuals but also addresses interpersonal relations and social structures. How did the convention attain this broad reach, and what does it tell us about the histories of human rights and disability...

A major contribution to the burgeoning field of global migration history, this book explores the historical clash between transnational networks of migrant mobility with state attempts to control them. Showcasing the latest research in the field, Melancholy Borders brings together a wide range of scholarship that illuminates the crucial role played by migration and migration regulation in the creation of...

The early sixteenth century saw the rise of two Mediterranean empires—the Christian Habsburgs, based in Spain and Austria, and the Muslim Ottomans, centered in the Balkans and Anatolia—with strikingly similar ambitions. Holy Roman Emperor Charles V (1500–1558) and Sultan Süleyman (1495–1566) each pursued grand universalist visions, seeking to unite Islam and Christendom under a universal monarchy that would resolve wars...