I have been reading a book by E. H. Carr entitled 'What is History?' for an upcoming interview at Oxford University. It was published back in the 1950's and whilst you may consider it to be outdated by contemporary texts of today you would be being extremely presumptuous.
In the book Carr outlines the idea that history itself is dictated by vast economic forces which the individual has no control over, following the Marxist idea. He also considers what makes good and bad history and how it is understood and interpreted by those studying it. He outlines the philosophical debate behind this idea and of course has plenty of 'giants' in the historical world which he quotes from. At the time of its publication his greatest critic was a man named Berlin who took the view that Carr's theory was not objective enough. Carr was basing his ideas around society of the time, rather than basing it on society of the period. He also claimed that Carr was stating that individuals had nothing to do with these economic forces which he felt was misleading and that Carr's claim that history would happen regardless of the individual. So for example he claimed industrialization would have occurred in Russia whether Stalin or Lenin had been in power. Of course this is theoretical.
In my opinion both economic forces and individuals play a part in shaping history. For example: Francis I certainly played a significant part in shaping France as a nation state in the 1500's whilst one could also attribute this change to economic forces which he had no control over. But these economic forces where to some extent random, good harvests were attributed to the stability in France during Francis' reign. The reason for this was not related to either economic forces or an individuals actions - it was nature, which one could say is random and completely detached from human influence - at least at that time in history - and as a result, one could tentatively suggest that History, whilst repeating itself in a general form, and whilst it is affected by the society, is random. There is no arrow pointing in one direction or another, events cannot be controlled only coerced into changing direction for a time before a new arrow is created.
What is the forums view on this? I'm pretty stuck myself. Its a difficult topic to broach even when writing it with the book in front of me let alone when being interviewed by Oxford Don's.
In the book Carr outlines the idea that history itself is dictated by vast economic forces which the individual has no control over, following the Marxist idea. He also considers what makes good and bad history and how it is understood and interpreted by those studying it. He outlines the philosophical debate behind this idea and of course has plenty of 'giants' in the historical world which he quotes from. At the time of its publication his greatest critic was a man named Berlin who took the view that Carr's theory was not objective enough. Carr was basing his ideas around society of the time, rather than basing it on society of the period. He also claimed that Carr was stating that individuals had nothing to do with these economic forces which he felt was misleading and that Carr's claim that history would happen regardless of the individual. So for example he claimed industrialization would have occurred in Russia whether Stalin or Lenin had been in power. Of course this is theoretical.
In my opinion both economic forces and individuals play a part in shaping history. For example: Francis I certainly played a significant part in shaping France as a nation state in the 1500's whilst one could also attribute this change to economic forces which he had no control over. But these economic forces where to some extent random, good harvests were attributed to the stability in France during Francis' reign. The reason for this was not related to either economic forces or an individuals actions - it was nature, which one could say is random and completely detached from human influence - at least at that time in history - and as a result, one could tentatively suggest that History, whilst repeating itself in a general form, and whilst it is affected by the society, is random. There is no arrow pointing in one direction or another, events cannot be controlled only coerced into changing direction for a time before a new arrow is created.
What is the forums view on this? I'm pretty stuck myself. Its a difficult topic to broach even when writing it with the book in front of me let alone when being interviewed by Oxford Don's.