Arnold J. Toynbee

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Arnold Joseph Toynbee (April 14, 1889 - October 22, 1975), British historian whose twelve-volume analysis of the rise and fall of civilizations, A Study of History, 1934 - 1961, was very popular in its time.

Toynbee, a prolific author, was the nephew of a great economic historian, Arnold Toynbee, with whom he is sometimes confused. Born in London, Arnold J was educated at Winchester College and Balliol College, Oxford. He began his teaching career at Balliol in 1912, and thereafter held posts at the University of London, the London School of Economics, and the Royal Institute of International Affairs.

Toynbee worked for the Intelligence department of the British Foreign Office during World War I, and was a delegate to the Paris Peace Conference in 1919. With his wife Veronica M. Boulter he was co-editor of A Survey of International Affairs. He worked for the Foreign Office again during World War II, and again attended the peace talks following the war. He was Director of Studies at the Royal Institute of International Affairs (1925-1955) and Research Professor of International History at the University of London.

Taking an approach similar to the one used by Oswald Spengler in The Decline of the West, Toynbee presented history as the rise and fall of civilizations, rather than the history of nation-states or of ethnic groups. He identified his civilizations according to cultural rather than national criteria. Thus, the "Western Civilization", comprising all the nations that have existed in Western Europe since the collapse of the Roman Empire, was treated as a whole, and distinguished from both the "Orthodox" civilization of Russia and the Balkans, and from the Greco-Roman civilization that preceded it.

He presented the history of each civilization in terms of challenge-and-response. Civilizations arose in response to some extremely difficult set of challenges, when "creative minorities" devised solutions to these challenges that reoriented their entire society. Some challenges and responses were physical, as when the Sumerians exploited the intractible swamps of Southern Iraq by organizing the neolithic inhabitants into society capable of carrying out large-scale irrigation projects; or social, as when the Catholic church resolved the chaos of post-Roman Europe by enrolling the new Germanic kingdoms in a single religious community. When a civilization responds to challenges, it grows. When it fails to respond to a challenge, it enters its period of decline. Toynbee rejected Spengler's deterministic view that civilizations rise and fall according to a natural and inevitable cycle.

His ideas have not perhaps proved of great influence on other historians; his overall theory certainly was taken up, for example by Curtius, as a sort of paradigm in the post-war period. The ideas he promoted had some vogue (he appeared on the cover of Time magazine in 1947). Toynbee was probably most influential in relation to Asian thinkers. A few of his terms, such as successor state, and to a lesser extent external proletariat, are found in other authors.

His theory was criticized, rightly or not, in that it emphasizes religion over other aspects in the big pictures of civilizations. This is similar to the present day theory of clash of civilizations paradigm put forward by Samuel Huntington.

It is assumed that Arnold J is the Toynbee referred to on the Toynbee tiles. His ideas also features in the Ray Bradbury short story named The Toynbee Convector.

Works

The Armenian Atrocities: The Murder of a Nation, with a speech delivered by Lord Bryce in the House of Lords

Hodder & Stoughton 1915

Nationality and the War

Dent 1915

The New Europe: Some Essays in Reconstruction, with an Introduction by the Earl of Cromer

Dent 1915

Contributor, Greece, in The Balkans: A History of Bulgaria, Serbia, Greece, Rumania, Turkey, various authors

Oxford, Clarendon Press 1915

Editor, The Treatment of Armenians in the Ottoman Empire, 1915-1916: Documents Presented to Viscount Grey of Fallodon by Viscount Bryce, with a Preface by Viscount Bryce

Hodder & Stoughton and His Majesty's Stationery Office 1916

The Belgian Deportations, with a statement by Viscount Bryce

T. Fisher Unwin 1917

The German Terror in Belgium: An Historical Record

Hodder & Stoughton 1917

The German Terror in France: An Historical Record

Hodder & Stoughton 1917

Turkey: A Past and a Future

Hodder & Stoughton 1917

The Western Question in Greece and Turkey: A Study in the Contact of Civilizations

Constable 1922

Introduction and translations, Greek Civilization and Character: The Self-Revelatiom of Ancient Greek Society

Dent 1924

Introduction and translations, Greek Historical Thought from Homer to the Age of Heraclius, with two pieces newly translated by Gilbert Murray

Dent 1924

Contributor, The Non-Arab Territories of the Ottoman Empire since the Armistice of the 30th October, 1918, in H. W. V. Temperley, editor, A History of the Peace Conference of Paris, Vol VI

Oxford University Press under the auspices of the British Institute of International Affairs 1924

The World after the Peace Conference, Being an Epilogue to the “History of the Peace Conference of Paris” and a Prologue to the “Survey of International Affairs, 1920-1923”

Oxford University Press under the auspices of the British Institute of International Affairs 1925. Published on its own, but Toynbee writes that it was “originally written as an introduction to the Survey of International Affairs in 1920-1923, and was intended for publication as part of the same volume”.

With Kenneth P. Kirkwood, Turkey

Benn 1926, in Modern Nations series edited by H. A. L. Fisher

The Conduct of British Empire Foreign Relations since the Peace Settlement

Oxford University Press under the auspices of the Royal Institute of International Affairs 1928

A Journey to China, or Things Which Are Seen

Constable 1931

Editor, British Commonwealth Relations, Proceedings of the FIrst Unofficial Conference at Toronto, 11-21 September 1933, with a foreword by Robert L. Borden

Oxford University Press under the joint auspices of the Royal Institute of International Affairs and the Canadian Institute of International Affairs 1934

A Study of History

Vol I: Introduction; The Geneses of Civilizations

Vol II: The Geneses of Civilizations

Vol III: The Growths of Civilizations

Oxford University Press 1934

Editor, with J. A. K. Thomson, Essays in Honour of Gilbert Murray

George Allen & Unwin 1936

A Study of History

Vol IV: The Breakdowns of Civilizations

Vol V: The Disintegrations of Civilizations

Vol VI: The Disintegrations of Civilizations

Oxford University Press 1939

D. C. Somervell, A Study of History: Abridgement of Vols I-VI, with a preface by Toynbee

Oxford University Press 1946

Civilization on Trial

Oxford University Press 1948

The Prospects of Western Civilization

New York, Columbia University Press 1949. Lectures delivered at Columbia University on themes from a then unpublished part of A Study of History. Published “by arrangement with Oxford University Press in an edition limited to 400 copies and not to be reissued”.

Albert Vann Fowler (editor), War and Civilization, Selections from A Study of History, with a preface by Toynbee

New York, Oxford University Press 1950

Introduction and translations, Twelve Men of Action in Greco-Roman History

Boston, Beacon Press 1952. Extracts from Thucydides, Xenophon, Plutarch and Polybius.

The World and the West

Oxford University Press 1953. Reith Lectures for 1952.

A Study of History

Vol VII: Universal States; Universal Churches

Vol VIII: Heroic Ages; Contacts between Civilizations in Space

Vol IX: Contacts between Civilizations in Time; Law and Freedom in History; The Prospects of the Western Civilization

Vol X: The Inspirations of Historians; A Note on Chronology

Oxford University Press 1954

An Historian's Approach to Religion

Oxford University Press 1956

D. C. Somervell, A Study of History: Abridgement of Vols VII-X, with a preface by Toynbee

Oxford University Press 1957

Christianity among the Religions of the World

New York, Scribner 1957; London, Oxford University Press 1958. Hewett Lectures, delivered in 1956.

Democracy in the Atomic Age

Melbourne, Oxford University Press under the auspices of the Australian Institute of International Affairs 1957. Dyason Lectures, delivered in 1956.

East to West: A Journey round the World

Oxford University Press 1958

Hellenism: The History of a Civilization

Oxford University Press 1959, in Home University Library

With Edward D. Myers, A Study of History

Vol XI: Historical Atlas and Gazetteer

Oxford University Press 1959

D. C. Somervell, A Study of History: Abridgement of Vols I-X in one volume, with a new preface by Toynbee and new tables

Oxford University Press 1960

A Study of History

Vol XII: Reconsiderations

Oxford University Press 1961

Between Oxus and Jumna

Oxford University Press 1961

America and the World Revolution

Oxford University Press 1962. Public lectures delivered at the University of Pennsylvania, spring 1961.

The Economy of the Western Hemisphere

Oxford University Press 1962. Weatherhead Foundation Lectures delivered at the University of Puerto Rico, February 1962.

The Present-Day Experiment in Western Civilization

Oxford University Press 1962. Beatty Memorial Lectures delivered at McGill University, Montreal, 1961.

The three sets of lectures published separately in the UK in 1962 appeared in New York in the same year in one volume under the title America and the World Revolution and Other Lectures, Oxford University Press.

Universal States

New York, Oxford University Press 1963. Separate publication of part of Vol VII of A Study of History.

Universal Churches

New York, Oxford University Press 1963. Separate publication of part of Vol VII of A Study of History.

With Philip Toynbee, Comparing Notes: A Dialogue across a Generation

Weidenfeld & Nicolson 1963. “Conversations between Arnold Toynbee and his son, Philip … as they were recorded on tape.”

Between Niger and Nile

Oxford University Press 1965

Hannibal's Legacy: The Hannibalic War's Effects on Roman Life

Vol I: Rome and Her Neighbours before Hannibal's Entry

Vol II: Rome and Her Neighbours after Hannibal's Exit

Oxford University Press 1965

Change and Habit: The Challenge of our Time

Oxford University Press 1966. Partly based on lectures given at the University of Denver in the last quarter of 1964, and at New College, Sarasota, Florida and the University of the South, Sewanee, Tennessee in the first quarter of 1965.

Acquaintances

Oxford University Press 1967

Between Maule and Amazon

Oxford University Press 1967

Editor, Cities of Destiny

Thames & Hudson 1967

Editor and principal contributor, Man's Concern with Death

Hodder & Stoughton 1968

Editor, The Crucible of Christianity: Judaism, Hellenism and the Historical Background to the Christian Faith

Thames & Hudson 1969

Experiences

Oxford University Press 1969

Some Problems of Greek History

Oxford University Press 1969

Cities on the Move

Oxford University Press 1970. Sponsored by the Institute of Urban Environment of the School of Architecture, Columbia University.

Surviving the Future

Oxford University Press 1971. Rewritten version of a dialogue between Toynbee and Professor Kei Wakaizumi of Kyoto Sangyo University: essays preceded by questions by Wakaizumi.

With Jane Caplan, A Study of History, new one volume abridgement, with new material and revisions and, for the first time, illustrations

Thames & Hudson 1972

Constantine Porphyrogenitus and His World

Oxford University Press 1973

Editor, Half the World: The History and Culture of China and Japan

Thames & Hudson 1973

Toynbee on Toynbee: A Conversation between Arnold J. Toynbee and G. R. Urban

New York, Oxford University Press 1974

Mankind and Mother Earth: A Narrative History of the World

Oxford University Press 1976, posthumous

Richard L. Gage (editor), The Toynbee-Ikeda Dialogue: Man Himself Must Choose

Oxford University Press 1976, posthumous. The record of a conversation lasting several days.

E. W. F. Tomlin (editor), Arnold Toynbee: A Selection from His Works, with an introduction by Tomlin

Oxford University Press 1978, posthumous. Includes advance extracts from The Greeks and Their Heritages.

The Greeks and Their Heritages

Oxford University Press 1981, posthumous

Christian B. Peper (editor), An Historian's Conscience: The Correspondence of Arnold J. Toynbee and Columba Cary-Elwes, Monk of Ampleforth, with a foreword by Lawrence L. Toynbee

Oxford University Press by arrangement with Beacon Press, Boston 1987, posthumous

The Survey of International Affairs was published by Oxford University Press under the auspices of the Royal Institute of International Affairs between 1925 and 1977 and covered the years 1920-1963. Toynbee wrote, with assistants, the Pre-War Series (covering the years 1920-1938) and the War-Time Series (1938-1946), and contributed introductions to the first two volumes of the Post-War Series (1947-48 and 1949-50). His actual contributions varied in extent from year to year.

A complementary series, Documents on International Affairs, covering the years 1928-1963, was published by Oxford University Press between 1929 and 1973. Toynbee supervised the compilation of the first of the 1939-46 volumes, and wrote a preface for both that and the 1947-48 volume.

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