Modern Naval History Debates and Prospects - by Richard Harding (Paperback)

Book Synopsis

Specifically structured around research questions and avenues for further study, and providing the historical context to enable this further research, Modern Naval Historyis a key historiographical guide for students wishing to gain a deeper understanding of naval history and its contemporary relevance.

Navies play an important role in the modern world, and the globalisation of economies, cultures and societies has placed a premium on maritime communications. Modern Naval History demonstrates the importance of naval history today, showing its relevance to a number of disciplines and its role in understanding how navies relate to their host societies.

Richard Harding explains why naval history is still important, despite slipping from the attention of policy makers and the public since 1945, and how it can illuminate answers to questions relating to economic, diplomatic, political, social and cultural history. The book explores how naval history has informed these fields and how it can produce a richer and more informed historical understanding of navies and sea power.

Review Quotes

Harding has produced a remarkably concise and useful volume that succeeds in sketching out the important debates within naval history, as well as making a good case for the topic's enduring importance. Furthermore, the author has done an admirable job in establishing that naval history is very much a part of the community of academic historians, and is far more than the simple chronicle of admirals, captains, and battles at sea that some have claimed. This book will be required reading for graduate students and scholars engaged in serious scholarship on modern naval history for at least the next decade, and Harding should be commended for this major contribution to its study.
Journal of World History

Richard Harding's new volume is certainly the most important single contribution to understanding the field of modern naval history in recent years. With numerous reference notes and a full bibliography ... Harding succinctly describes and analyses the main trends, debates, and issues within this sub-field of the broader subject of maritime history.
The International Journal of Maritime History

This book will undoubtedly prove to be an initial navigational chart for many future research projects. History professors teaching naval history will find it invaluable for student understanding of the broad issues interwoven throughout the subject. Seasoned researchers will find it a valuable reference. Importantly, those in adjacent historical fields, of which Harding describes many, would do well to pick through this book for the potential contributions of naval history to their own research. In this book, we have a tool that does what it says on the tin.
Journal for Maritime Research

About the Author

Richard Harding is Professor of Organisational History and Head of the Department of Leadership and Development, Westminster Business School, University of Westminster, UK. He has authored and edited numerous books on naval history, was editor of the Mariner's Mirror (2000-2005) and Chairman of the Society for Nautical Research (2005-11). He is also a Fellow of the Royal Historical Society.