The title of
Diamond's book refers to some of the factors which are traditionally considered critical in
explaining European dominance in world affairs; essentially, that the Europeans had superior
technology and, by coincidence, far more deadly diseases than many of the non-European cultures
they encountered, which led to an easy subjugation. This evolved into the modern prevalence of
European culture, if not direct political rule.
Yali is introduced in aset in
the 1970s, when Diamond was doing research in New Guinea. At the time, part of the island was
attempting to establish political independence from Australia, essentially a microcosm of the
global question that the book investigates. Yali was a local politician who, in Diamond's view,
was still far less well-off than his white counterparts despite being the equivalent of a
political celebrity among his own people. Yali and Diamond had a discussion about their
respective cultures, culminating in Yali's question:
"Why is it that you
white people developed so much cargo and brought it to New Guinea, but we black people had
little cargo of our own?"
Cargo referred generally to the manufactured
goods developed by whites which broadly defined the "before" and "after"
contact changes in New Guinean culture. Diamond's book is an attempt to answer Yali's question;
however, it should also be taken into consideration that Yali had a view of material goods that
was nearly religious, and his reasonings and motivations behind the question were probably not,
in my opinion, aligned with Diamond's interpretation of it.
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