Much of human history has consisted of unequal conflicts between the haves and the have-nots.

The history of interactions among disparate peoples is what shaped the modern world through conquest, epidemics and genocide. Those collisions created reverberations that have still not died down after many centuries, and that are actively continuing in some of the world's most troubled areas.

...neither life nor history is an enterprise for those who seek simplicity and consistency.

We study the injustices of history for the same reason that we study genocide, and for the same reason that psychologists study the minds of murderers and rapists... to understand how those evil things came about.

Easter Island collapsed in not just an epidemic of civil war but cannibalism. Of all the collapses of the past, I find the one that grabs people the most is that of Easter Island.

History as well as life itself is complicated -- neither life nor history is an enterprise for those who seek simplicity and consistency.