What went wrong?

About “What went wrong?”

For many centuries, the Islamic world was a leading force in military, economic, and cultural development. Christian Europe was viewed as a distant and backward region. However, this changed as the West began to surpass the Islamic world in various areas. In this book, Bernard Lewis explores how the Islamic world reacted to this shift, trying to understand why it had fallen behind. He describes how Middle Eastern societies turned their attention to learning about Western advancements in military, commerce, governance, and culture. Some blamed external and internal factors, while others questioned where they had gone wrong and how to recover. Lewis compares Western and Middle Eastern cultures from the 18th to the 20th centuries, examining differences in religion, arts, women's roles, and society.