From our earliest wanderings within and out of Africa and the earth-shattering repercussions of the Age of Exploration to the building of the US–Mexico border wall, here is a succinct account of human migration—an essential, millennia-long feature of humanity
For hundreds of thousands of years, the ability of Homo sapiens to travel across vast distances and adapt to new environments has been key to our survival as a species. And yet this deep migratory impulse is being tested as never before. The number of international migrants has increased five decades in a row; still, many governments are making migration more difficult. Climate change and increased global conflict continue to create new migrants, while governments—building ever-stronger walls and raising barriers to progress—are harming the lives of migrants and threatening the future well-being of our societies.
In The Shortest History of Migration, visionary thinker Ian Goldin—Oxford professor of globalization, former adviser to Nelson Mandela, former vice president of the World Bank, and himself an emigrant—identifies key milestones that tell the story of human migration, spanning every age and continent. With over one hundred illustrations, including more than twenty-five maps, and using ancient records and the latest genetic research, Goldin’s fast-paced account carefully examines the legacies of empire, slavery, and war. In unique immigrant spotlights throughout, he tells strange, terrible, and uplifting tales of individual migrants—a Jewish man saved by the Kindertransport, a Japanese gardener who lands in Lima, an escaped Irish convict worker on the road to Tasmania.
Goldin also turns his attention to today’s world. Blending his knowledge of economics and globalization, and incorporating lessons from history, Goldin offers a detailed picture of modern-day migration and lays out commonsense policies for countries grappling with it. At once an illuminating history and a vision for the future, The Shortest History of Migration is a moving portrait of humanity and a chance to learn from our past.
