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Item Details
| Title:
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THE RETREAT OF THE ELEPHANTS
CHINA'S HISTORY FROM AN ENVIRONMENTAL PERSPECTIVE |
| By: |
Mark Elvin |
| Format: |
Paperback |
| List price:
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£26.50 |
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We currently do not stock this item, please contact the publisher directly for
further information.
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| ISBN 10: |
0813328977 |
| ISBN 13: |
9780813328973 |
| Publisher: |
INGRAM PUBLISHER SERVICES US |
| Pub. date: |
14 January, 1999 |
| Series: |
New Perspectives on Asian History S. |
| Pages: |
416 |
| Description: |
This volume examines the interaction of Chinese with their environment from ancient times to the present, yielding insights into the relationship between humans and nature. It argues that cultures that have exploited the environment have tended to gain a distinct advantage over those that have not. |
| Synopsis: |
This volume is an examination of the interaction of Chinese with their environment from ancient times to the present, yielding insights into the relationship between humans and nature. The only wild elephants in the People's Republic of China today are those in a few protected enclaves in the Southwest, up against the border with Burma. Where did they all go? The most obvious explanation is that it was the result of a protracted war with human beings which the elephants lost. Basically, Chinese farmers and elephants do not mix. In "The Retreat of the Elephants", Mark Elvin views Chinese history through the changing relationships between people and environmental systems that both supported and threatened them, often in complex ways. The settled regions of China are some of the most intensely developed and densely settled environments on earth. Irrigation scars the landscape, and the forests have all but disappeared. Elvin's history investigates the social and economic forces that drove the long-term environmental transformation of China. He introduces us to the ways the Chinese people have historically understood, valued, and exploited the natural world in which they lived.He argues that cultures that have actively exploited their environment have tended to gain a distinct advantage over those that have not. Elvin makes amply clear that an understanding of that fact gives us a much richer appreciation of Chinese history and, by extension, the planet we live in. The same might be said of the Chinese environment as a whole. In "The Retreat of the Elephants", Mark Elvin views Chinese history through the changing relationships between people and environmental systems that both supported and threatened them, often in complex ways. The settled regions of China are some of the most intensely developed and densely settled environments on earth. Irrigation scars the landscape, and the forests have all but disappeared. Elvin's history investigates the social and economic forces that drove the long-term environmental transformation of China. He asks how these environmental transformations, especially the vast irrigation projects and deforestation, have interacted with economic growth and with the development of social and political institutions in China.He introduces us to the ways in which the Chinese have historically understood, valued, and exploited the natural world in which they lived. He argues that cultures that have actively exploited their environment have tended to gain a distinct advantage over those that have not. China is one of those cultures, and Elvin makes clear that an understanding of that fact gives us a much richer appreciation of Chinese history and, by extension, the planet with live in. |
| Publication: |
US |
| Imprint: |
Westview Press Inc |
| Returns: |
Non-returnable |
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