DOCSLIB.ORG

Environmental History, Political Economy and Change: Frameworks and Tools for Research and Analysis • Ronnie D

Total Page：16

File Type：pdf, Size：1020Kb

Download full-text PDF Read full-text
Environmental History, Political Economy and Change: Frameworks and Tools for Research and Analysis • Ronnie D Environmental History, Political Economy and Change: Frameworks and Tools for Research and Analysis • Ronnie D. Lipschutz* RonnieEnvironmental D. Lipschutz History, Political Economy and Change What kinds of insights can environmental history provide that would enhance understanding of the political economy and sociology of human-nature rela- tionships?1 And what tools can such political economy and sociology offer in the search for environmental policies and strategies leading to sustainable, rather than destructive, relationships between human societies and nature? These two questions motivate this article, although they only begin to address what is clearly a complex undertaking:crafting environmental policies that are just and democratic, as well as sustainable and effective. Behind these questions lie others:Why engage in such an effort? Who beneªts? From whose standpoint is the activity to be undertaken? What is an appropriate analytical framework? What approaches to the study of the histories of some places will best inform at- tempts to describe what is happening today and what might occur in the future in other places? This article represents the cumulation of several years of thought and writ- ing focused on all of these questions.2 The substance of my argument is as fol- lows:While most environmental history is seen as having to do with landscapes past and how they got that way, environmental history can also have practical contemporary applications. By coming to understand the sources and origins of environmental degradation, and the patterns of social organization that led to them, we may be better positioned to foster environmental protection and conservation in ways that may resolve and/or support local efforts around * This article was originally prepared for presentation in an APSA Science, Technology and Envi- ronmental Politics Workshop on “New Frontiers in Environmental Research,” Northeastern University, Boston, Mass., September 2, 1998. Parts of the article are drawn from a number of earlier memorandums, thinkpieces and proposals. Zsuzsanna Gille was an original co-author of earlier versions of several parts of this paper, while Carolyn Merchant, Margaret FitzSimmons, Carolyn Pomeroy, and two anonymous readers, among others, made substantive and editorial contributions along the way. 1. I use the lower-case term “nature” to refer to the biogeophysical world, and the upper-case term “Nature” to refer to the ideological/ideational concept. 2. Lipschutz 1996. Global Environmental Politics 1:3, August 2001 © 2001 by the Massachusetts Institute of Technology 72 Downloaded from http://www.mitpressjournals.org/doi/pdf/10.1162/152638001316881412 by guest on 30 September 2021 Ronnie D. Lipschutz • 73 the world. Such studies can help to address conºicts that arise over conservation policies, especially when these studies illuminate the origins and historical trajectories of places, and provide insights into ways of working with, rather than against, local cultures, knowledges, and social arrangements. In other words, to understand, imagine, and shape landscapes in the future, we need to know how they were created in the past. As Donald Worster, one of the best- known contemporary American historians of the environment, wrote some years ago: We [environmental historians] are not concerned merely with the history of literary reactions to nature or of conservation policies, as important as those are. We are, in the largest sense, interested in all the ways people organize themselves into patterns of power, production, and ideology in the presence of what we conventionally call nature—the nonhuman world. Our goal is to discover, through the study of the past, some general ideas about how to make those patterns work better in the future for both ourselves and the rest of the world.3 I begin this paper with a discussion of the relationship between environ- mental history, political economy, sociology and policy and then turn more ex- plicitly to practices of environmental history and matters of scale. In the ªnal section, I address some questions of method and research strategy. The Transformation of Nature and the Nature of Transformations From the perspective of the social sciences and humanities, one of the things generally absent from environmental policy analysis and practice is an adequate understanding of the relationship between human societies and nature. Debates over causality, and the practical and ethical implications of competing analyti- cal approaches, are much too complex to summarize here;4 sufªce it to say that two of the best-known approaches point either toward continuing human ma- nipulation of nature in order to “improve” it or “living lightly on the earth” and returning to some, largely mythical, “natural” relationship characteristic of an imagined earlier time. While both offer guidelines for policy-making, they are also seriously ºawed. The former is widely-agreed to not be viable over the lon- ger-term and, in any event, would require an impossible degree of centralized management, while the latter dictates a substantial change in both the material and cognitive realms of human activity and even massive reductions in human numbers (and, as I discuss below, there are serious contradictions in assuming that such an Edenic “state of Nature” ever actually existed). This does not mean, however, that we cannot change or develop sustainable practices. Rather, it indi- cates that we need to better understand how social change in more environmen- tally friendly directions has taken place in the past and how it could come about 3. Worster 1987, 251. 4. See, for example, Redclift and Benton 1994. Downloaded from http://www.mitpressjournals.org/doi/pdf/10.1162/152638001316881412 by guest on 30 September 2021 74 • Environmental History, Political Economy and Change in the future.5 But making policy without any deep awareness of history and po- litical economy virtually ensures that we will not be able to devise sustainable practices. Several methodological and conceptual shortcomings stand as obstacles to realistic and effective environmental policy analysis. One has to do with its economistic assumptions, a second with questions of scale, a third with the problem of social change, and a fourth with meaning. Taken together, these shortcomings suggest that we ought not to view environmental damage in terms of a limited and deterministic causal explanation (although such explana- tions can be useful) to which straighforward policy tools can be applied; rather, we must pursue a deeper focus on hermeneutic/descriptive analyses (similar to “thick description”) that combine history and political economy with structure and agency. In particular, policy analysis tends toward reiªed assumptions about the economic motivations of actions6 and, as a result, policy analysts dis- place environmental problems from the sphere of social practice and politics to that of economics.7 In this same context, environmental policy analysts usually avoid questions of meaning when they address the relationship of various social actors to nature. I address each of these points below. Errors of Economism Much environmental policy analysis is focused at the macro-level, formulated in a very generalized form, and based on a set of assumptions regarding the be- havior of economically “rational” actors. In the language of rational choice, preferences are assumed to be exogenously determined and additive, and this permits generalization about the joint preferences of entire groups or commu- nities. These assumptions do not hold up well on closer inspection, although not for the reasons usually adduced within the literature critical of rational choice theory.8 Not only are these assumptions applied in similar fashion across cultures, they are also assumed to apply uniformly within industrial societies, which can also exhibit a high degree of diversity at relevant scales of political economy, such as the landscape or community. To be more precise, not only are many preferences endogenously determined, they are also the outgrowth of long-term processes and relationships—social, economic, cultural—that have developed within bounded areas and regions. Space and Place This points, therefore, to the ever-present dilemma of scale:Over what space ought environmental damage and change be studied, environmental analysis performed, and policies implemented? As I have argued elsewhere, although 5. Lipschutz 1996, ch. 7–8. 6. Stone 1997. 7. Hay 1994. 8. Green and Shapiro 1994. Downloaded from http://www.mitpressjournals.org/doi/pdf/10.1162/152638001316881412 by guest on 30 September 2021 Ronnie D. Lipschutz • 75 many environmental problems are conventionally framed in supra-regional, national, and global terms, due to the transboundary or global nature of struc- tural forces and physical processes, the immediate causes and consequences of such problems are generally quite localized.9 All fossil fueled plants emit carbon dioxide, but each plant has a somewhat different social organization and is lo- cated in a socially-unique place. Such “local” diversity among societies is recog- nized by anthropologists and rural sociologists, of course, although researchers in these disciplines work infrequently in industrialized countries.10 Changing Places Another major lacuna in environmental policy analysis has to do with an in- complete understanding of how individuals and societies initiate changes in their environments and how they, in turn, respond to
Load more

Recommended publications
  • Rcguha's Deep Ecology
    R.C.Guha’s Deep Ecology The respected radical journalist Kirkpatrick sale recently celebrated “the passion of a new and growing movement that has become disenchanted with the environmental establishment. Decrying the narrowly economic goals of mainstream environmentalism, this new movement aims at nothing less than a philosophical and cultural revolution in human attitudes toward nature. Ramchandra Guha develop a critique of deep ecology from the perspective of a sympathetic outsider. Ramchandra Guha’s treatment of deep ecology is primarily historical and sociological, rather than philosophical, in nature. He makes two main arguments : first, that deep ecology is uniquely American. Second, that the social consequences of putting deep ecology into practice on a worldwide basis are very grave indeed. The defining characteristics of deep ecology are fourfold. First, deep ecology argues that the environmental movement must shift from an “anthropocentric” to a “bio-centric” perspective. The anthropocentric------ bio-centric distinction is accepted as axiomatic by deep ecologists, it structures their discourse, and much of the present discussions remains mired within it. The second characteristic of deep ecology is its focus on the preservation of unsploilt wilderness and the restoration of degraded areas to a more pristine condition – to the relative neglect of other issues on the environmental agenda. Historically, it represents a playing out of the preservationist and utilitarian dichotomy that has plagued American environmentalism since the turn of the century. Morally, it is an imperative that follows from the bio-centric perspective ; other species of plants and animals, and nature itself ,have an intrinsic right to exist. And finally, the preservation of wilderness also turns on a scientific argument – viz.; the value of biological diversity in stabilizing ecological regimes and in retaining a gene pool for future generations.
    [Show full text]
  • Environmental Studies
    ENVIRONMENTAL STUDIES Richard Van Buskirk, Chair; Deke Gundersen The Environmental Studies Department (www.pacificu.edu/as/enviro/) in the College of Arts and Sciences provides students with an education that takes full advantage of Pacific University's liberal arts curriculum. In this program, students and faculty have opportunities to pursue interests that span a wide range of disciplines. In addition to the two full-time faculty members in the department, Environmental Studies offers the expertise of faculty affiliated with the program who are based in the disciplines of biology, chemistry, political science, economics, history, art, sociology, anthropology, philosophy and literature. This results in a wide range of opportunities to investigate environmental problems that cross traditional boundaries. Students in Environmental Studies can choose to apply their knowledge through research opportunities in unique nearby surroundings such as the coniferous forest of the John Blodgett Arboretum, the riparian corridors of the Gales Creek and Tualatin River watersheds, and the 750-acre Fernhill Wetlands. The B Street Permaculture Project (a 15-minute walk from campus) is a learning laboratory for sustainability that directly addresses the human component of environmental problem solving. Regionally, there are many exemplary resources available within a one- to two-hour drive of campus such as the Willamette and Columbia Rivers, Tillamook and Willapa Bays, and the forests of the Coast and Cascade Ranges. The proximity of Pacific University to study sites both wild and human-influenced is one of the main strengths of the Environmental Studies program. The Environmental Studies curriculum includes majors that lead to a Bachelor of Science (B.S.) or a Bachelor of Arts (B.A.) degree.
    [Show full text]
  • Useful Categories of Analysis in Environmental History
    Santa Clara University Scholar Commons History College of Arts & Sciences 10-16-2014 Women and Gender: Useful Categories of Analysis in Environmental History Nancy Unger Santa Clara University, [email protected] Follow this and additional works at: https://scholarcommons.scu.edu/history Part of the Environmental Studies Commons, Feminist, Gender, and Sexuality Studies Commons, Political History Commons, Social Justice Commons, and the Women's History Commons Recommended Citation Unger, N. (2014). Women and Gender: Useful Categories of Analysis in Environmental History. In A. Isenberg (Ed.), Oxford Handbook of Environmental History. Oxford University Press, pp. 600-643. This material was originally published in Oxford Handbook of Environmental History edited by Andrew Isenberg, and has been reproduced by permission of Oxford University Press. For permission to reuse this material, please visit http://www.oup.co.uk/academic/rights/permissions. This Book Chapter is brought to you for free and open access by the College of Arts & Sciences at Scholar Commons. It has been accepted for inclusion in History by an authorized administrator of Scholar Commons. For more information, please contact [email protected]. CHAPTER 21 WOMEN AND GENDER Useful Categories of Analysis in Environmental History NANCY C. UNGER IN 1990, Carolyn Merchant proposed, in a roundtable discussion published in The Journal of American History, that gender perspective be added to the conceptual frameworks in environmental history. 1 Her proposal was expanded by Melissa Leach and Cathy Green in the British journal Environment and History in 1997. 2 The ongoing need for broader and more thoughtful and analytic investigations into the powerful relationship between gender and the environment throughout history was confirmed in 2001 by Richard White and Vera Norwood in "Environmental History, Retrospect and Prospect," a forum in the Pacific Historical Review.
    [Show full text]
  • Teaching the Environmental Humanities International Perspectives and Practices
    CORE Metadata, citation and similar papers at core.ac.uk Provided by ResearchSPace - Bath Spa University Teaching the Environmental Humanities International Perspectives and Practices EMILY O’ GORMAN Department of Geography and Planning, Macquarie University, Australia THOM VAN DOOREN Department of Gender and Cultural Studies, University of Sydney, Australia URSULA MÜNSTER Oslo School of Environmental Humanities, Department of Culture Studies and Oriental Languages, University of Olso, Norway JONI ADAMSON Department of English and Julie Ann Wrigley Global Institute of Sustainability, Arizona State University, USA CHRISTOF MAUCH Rachel Carson Center for Environment and Society, Ludwig-Maximilians-Universität Munich, Germany SVERKER SÖRLIN, MARCO ARMIERO, KATI LINDSTRÖM Division of History of Science, Technology, and Environment, KTH Royal Institute of Technology, Sweden DONNA HOUSTON Department of Geography and Planning, Macquarie University, Australia JOSÉ AUGUSTO PÁDUA Institute of History, Federal University of Rio de Janeiro, Brazil KATE RIGBY Research Centre for Environmental Humanities, Bath Spa University, UK OWAIN JONES College of Liberal Arts, Bath Spa University, UK JUDY MOTION Environmental Humanities, University of New South Wales, Australia STEPHEN MUECKE School of Humanities, University of Adelaide, Australia Environmental Humanities 11:2 (November 2019) DOI 10.1215/22011919-7754545 © 2019 Each Author This is an open access article distributed under the terms of a Creative Commons license (CC BY-NC-ND 3.0). 428 Environmental
    [Show full text]
  • Environmental Worldviews, Ethics, and Sustainability 25
    Environmental Worldviews, Ethics, and Sustainability 25 Biosphere 2—A Lesson in Humility C O R E C A S E S TUDY In 1991, eight scientists (four men and four women) were sealed sphere’s 25 small animal species went extinct. Before the 2-year inside Biosphere 2, a $200 million glass and steel enclosure period was up, all plant-pollinating insects went extinct, thereby designed to be a self-sustaining life-support system (Figure 25-1) dooming to extinction most of the plant species. that would add to our understanding of Biosphere 1: the earth’s Despite many problems, the facility’s waste and wastewater life-support system. were recycled. With much hard work, the Biospherians were A sealed system of interconnected domes was built in the also able to produce 80% of their food supply, despite rampant desert near Tucson, Arizona (USA). It contained artificial ecosys- weed growths, spurred by higher CO2 levels, that crowded out tems including a tropical rain forest, savanna, and desert, as well food crops. However, they suffered from persistent hunger and as lakes, streams, freshwater and saltwater wetlands, and a mini- weight loss. ocean with a coral reef. In the end, an expenditure of $200 million failed to maintain Biosphere 2 was designed to mimic the earth’s natural chemi- this life-support system for eight people for 2 years. Since 2007, cal recycling systems. Water evaporated from its ocean and other the University of Arizona has been leasing the Biosphere 2 facility aquatic systems and then condensed to provide rainfall over the for biological research and to provide environmental education tropical rain forest.
    [Show full text]
  • Business and Sustainability: New Business History Perspectives
    Business and Sustainability: New Business History Perspectives Ann-Kristin Bergquist Working Paper 18-034 Business and Sustainability: New Business History Perspectives Ann-Kristin Bergquist Harvard Business School Working Paper 18-034 Copyright © 2017 by Ann-Kristin Bergquist Working papers are in draft form. This working paper is distributed for purposes of comment and discussion only. It may not be reproduced without permission of the copyright holder. Copies of working papers are available from the author. Business and Sustainability: New Business History Perspectives Ann-Kristin Bergquist Abstract: This working paper provides a long-term business history perspective on environmental sustainability. For a long time, the central issues addressed in the discipline of business history concerned how business enterprises innovated and created wealth, as well as patterns of success and failure in that process, but there now exists a compelling stream of new research focused on the environmental consequences of economic growth. The earliest theme to be explored, is the story of how and why some conventional industries sought to become less polluting. Researchers have dated this phenomenon back to the late nineteenth century, showed it gained momentum from the 1960s, and explored how it resulted in the mainstreaming of sustainability rhetoric, and sometimes practice, in large Western corporations from the 1980s. A more recent research theme has been the story of how for-profit entrepreneurs developed entire new product categories such as organic food and wind and solar energy. This process has also been traced back to the nineteenth century. With the rise in green consumerism and public policy support in some developed countries (primarily in Europe) for sustainability during the 1990s, these two historical trends met, as the concept of sustainable development spread to large conventional corporations, and visionary green firms scaled or were acquired by conventional big businesses.
    [Show full text]
  • CAN ENVIRONMENTAL HISTORY SAVE the WORLD? Sarah Brown Steve Dovers Jodi Frawley Andrea Gaynor Heather Goodall Grace Karskens Steve Mullins
    FORUM CAN ENVIRONMENTAL HISTORY SAVE THE WORLD? Sarah Brown Steve Dovers Jodi Frawley Andrea Gaynor Heather Goodall Grace Karskens Steve Mullins As a ‘genre of history’ in Australia environmental history is relatively new, emerging in the 1960s and 70s from encounters between history, geography and the natural sciences in the context of growing environ- mental concern and activism. Interdisciplinary in orientation, the field also exhibited an unusually high level of engagement with current environmental issues and organisations. In this era of national research priorities and debates about the role and purpose of university-based research, it therefore seemed fair to ask: ‘can environmental history save the world?’ In response, a panel of new and established researchers offer their perspectives on issues of relevance and utility within this diverse and dynamic genre. This article has been peer-reviewed. TANGLED ROOTS, SPREADING BRANCHES Andrea Gaynor Dr. Andrea Gaynor is a member of the History Discipline Group in the School of Humanities at the University of Western Australia. Her most recent publication is Harvest of the Suburbs: An Environmental History of Growing Food in Australian Cities (UWA Press 2006). Richard Grove (2001) has outlined a complex international and multidisciplinary genealogy for environmental history, stretching back to the late eighteenth century and pioneers of (western) conservation such as Alexander von Humboldt and George Perkins Marsh. However, environ- mental history as a more self-conscious – and perhaps exclusive – area of historical research and teaching emerged in the USA in the 1970s, when scholars such as Roderick Nash and John Opie began running courses in ‘environmental history’ and forming networks of historians interested in past human-environment relations.
    [Show full text]
  • Anthrozoology and Sharks, Looking at How Human-Shark Interactions Have Shaped Human Life Over Time
    Anthrozoology and Public Perception: Humans and Great White Sharks (Carchardon carcharias) on Cape Cod, Massachusetts, USA Jessica O’Toole A thesis submitted in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Master of Marine Affairs University of Washington 2020 Committee: Marc L. Miller, Chair Vincent F. Gallucci Program Authorized to Offer Degree School of Marine and Environmental Affairs © Copywrite 2020 Jessica O’Toole 2 University of Washington Abstract Anthrozoology and Public Perception: Humans and Great White Sharks (Carchardon carcharias) on Cape Cod, Massachusetts, USA Jessica O’Toole Chair of the Supervisory Committee: Dr. Marc L. Miller School of Marine and Environmental Affairs Anthrozoology is a relatively new field of study in the world of academia. This discipline, which includes researchers ranging from social studies to natural sciences, examines human-animal interactions. Understanding what affect these interactions have on a person’s perception of a species could be used to create better conservation strategies and policies. This thesis uses a mixed qualitative methodology to examine the public perception of great white sharks on Cape Cod, Massachusetts. While the area has a history of shark interactions, a shark related death in 2018 forced many people to re-evaluate how they view sharks. Not only did people express both positive and negative perceptions of the animals but they also discussed how the attack caused them to change their behavior in and around the ocean. Residents also acknowledged that the sharks were not the only problem living in the ocean. They often blame seals for the shark attacks, while also claiming they are a threat to the fishing industry.
    [Show full text]
  • Dr. Lee Lines Professor Department of Environmental Studies Rollins College – Winter Park, Florida
    Dr. Lee Lines Professor Department of Environmental Studies Rollins College – Winter Park, Florida Education: Ph.D. (Geography) Arizona State University (1995) Advisor: Dr. Patricia Fall M.A. (Geography) University of Florida (1989) B.A. (Geography) University of Florida (1987) Professional Interests: Physical Geography; Food and Environment; Climate Change; Sustainable Development; Conservation of Biodiversity; Geography of Florida and western North America Professional Experience: 2019 – present Chair, Department of Environmental Studies, Rollins College 2010 – present Professor of Environmental Studies, Rollins College 2004 – 2017 Chair, Department of Environmental Studies, Rollins College 2006 – 2011 Diane and Michael Maher Chair of Distinguished Teaching, Rollins College 2002 – 2009 Associate Professor of Environmental Studies, Rollins College 1996 – 2002 Assistant Professor of Environmental Studies, Rollins College 1995 – 1996 Faculty Associate, Dept. of Geography, Arizona State University Professional Awards and Recognition: • Cornell Award for Distinguished Teaching, Rollins College 2012 • Diane and Michael Maher Chair of Distinguished Teaching 2006 - 2011 • Hugh McKean Award, Rollins College 2009 and 2015 (recognizes outstanding teaching; selected by graduating senior class) • Cornell Award for Distinguished Service, Rollins College 2007 • Arthur Vining Davis Fellowship 2003 Current Project: Visible Climate: Postcards from America’s Changing Landscapes, Lee Lines and Rachel Simmons, 2020, print-on-demand artists book, open edition,
    [Show full text]
  • Anthrozoology As International Practice: a Student Conference in Animal Studies
    H-Announce Anthrozoology as International Practice: A Student Conference in Animal Studies Announcement published by Thomas Aiello on Tuesday, October 27, 2020 Type: Call for Papers Date: December 15, 2021 Location: United Kingdom Subject Fields: Animal Studies, Anthropology, Graduate Studies, Environmental History / Studies, Social Sciences Call for Papers: As a celebration of emerging voices, we invite current and prospective students interested in human- animal encounters to participate in our upcoming 2021 conference: ‘Anthrozoology as International Practice: A Student Conference in Animal Studies.’ Held by the University of Exeter’s Anthrozoology as Symbiotic Ethics (EASE) working group, this event is scheduled to take place virtually 4-5 March of 2021. The theme of our inaugural conference is ‘Emerging Voices’ where we will welcome presentations from students and early career researchers in anthrozoology and related fields (such as human-animal studies, natural sciences or philosophy). Abstracts on topics in all areas of anthrozoology will be considered, and applicants from any college or country are welcomed. This conference aims to spotlight research being undertaken by students around the world, in the hopes of building a global support network. Presentations based on PhD research proposals are also welcome. Who can present: Students in any Bachelor’s, Master’s, or PhD program Recent graduates from PhD programs. Individuals ‘in between’ the above programs Deadline for submissions: December 15, 2020 Citation: Thomas Aiello. Anthrozoology as International Practice: A Student Conference in Animal Studies. H-Announce. 10-27-2020. https://networks.h-net.org/node/73374/announcements/6653076/anthrozoology-international-practice-student-conference-animal Licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 3.0 United States License.
    [Show full text]
  • Food Justice and Everyday Environmental Expertise in the Salvadoran Permaculture Movement
    Millner, N. (2017). ‘The right to food is nature too’: food justice and everyday environmental expertise in the Salvadoran permaculture movement. Local Environment: The International Journal of Justice and Sustainability, 22(6), 764-783. https://doi.org/10.1080/13549839.2016.1272560 Peer reviewed version Link to published version (if available): 10.1080/13549839.2016.1272560 Link to publication record in Explore Bristol Research PDF-document This is the author accepted manuscript (AAM). The final published version (version of record) is available online via Taylor & Francis at http://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/13549839.2016.1272560. Please refer to any applicable terms of use of the publisher. University of Bristol - Explore Bristol Research General rights This document is made available in accordance with publisher policies. Please cite only the published version using the reference above. Full terms of use are available: http://www.bristol.ac.uk/red/research-policy/pure/user-guides/ebr-terms/ ! ! ! ! ‘The right to food is nature too’: Food justice and everyday environmental expertise in the Salvadorian permaculture movement ! ! Naomi Millnera ! ! ! ! aGeographical Sciences, University of Bristol, United Kingdom ! !1 Abstract In El Salvador a growing permaculture movement attunes small-scale farming activities to principles of ecological observation. The premise is twofold: close-grained appreciation of already- interacting biophysical processes allows for the design of complementary social and agricultural systems requiring minimum energy inputs. Secondly, the insistence on campesino smallholders as actors in the design of sustainable food systems directly addresses decades of ‘top-down’ developmental interventions, from Green Revolution experiments in the 1960s and 1970s to international food security programmes in the 1990s.
    [Show full text]
  • Environmental History As Kansas History
    Review Essay Series ENVIRONMENTAL HISTORY AS KANSAS HISTORY by Karl Brooks ongress created Kansas Territory in 1854 by inscribing fictional lines EDITORS’INTRODUCTION across the grasslands. Nature, that ever-present agent of change, paid One of the major goals of this the politicians no mind. Wind, weather, soil, and water—the whole review essay series is to give schol- suite of nonhuman phenomena—continued shaping Great Plains ars the opportunity to explore new Chuman history. Culture, in varieties nearly infinite, still enabled humans to cope paths and imagine new vistas in Kansas history. We hope to recover with natural forces and features. People living in what was now officially Kansas more of our past and increase in- still had to solve the basic ecological problem of enduring on the grasslands. The sight into it. Environmental history endless conversation—culture that expressed humans’ distinctive status inflect- in Kansas presents us with unique ing nature that owed nothing to humans—continued after 1854. This perpetual opportunities to do both. In this most recent installment, dialogue still transforms the land that gave life to its human occupants. Professor Karl Brooks offers an Environmental history opens new perspectives about how nature and human evaluation of historical approaches culture, operating in tandem, have perpetually re-made Kansas, this imagined rec- to the meaning of environment in tangle amid a real place. Since 1980 historians have better understood nature’s Kansas and ideas about new paths sovereign contributions to creating Kansas. “The subtlety and serenity of the scholars might forge. Historians writing before 1980 took for grant- grasslands define their character,” according to Daniel Licht, “but those same ed the assumption that nature—the traits engender a lack of focus compared with the jagged peaks and cascading wa- environment—was meant to be ters” farther west.1 Environmental history clarifies what was once murky by spot- shaped to man’s use.
    [Show full text]