Vol. 68, No. 6

<Conference report>
Hiroshi KITO
Challenges to the economic history of the environment: forests, development, markets

The 70th annual conference of the Socio-Economic History Society took place on May 19th and 20th, 2001, at Sophia University in Tokyo. The symposium was organized by Hiroshi KITO, with Kaoru SUGIHARA and Linda GROVE as moderators. It consisted of two keynote speeches and four reports on case studies of environmental and ecological history.

Kenneth POMERANZ reviewed the 'East Asian path of development' and discussed the divergence of China and Western Europe since the nineteenth century from the viewpoint of resources and the environment. Ryoichi YASUKUNI discussed how copper mining companies obtained fuel and timber in the Tokugawa and early Meiji periods through a case study of the Besshi copper mine.

Following these keynote speeches, three short papers were presented on the topic of ecological problems in relation to economic growth: Hiromichi TAKITA spoke on the shift to fossil fuels in Germany during the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, Haruka YANAGISAWA on changes in the use of common lands in south Indian villages over the past hundred years, and Makoto UEDA on economic aspects of the ecosystem in Chinese mountain areas with reference to the Shed people (Pengmin). Finally, Osamu SAITO presented some comments on silvicultural growth.

Kenneth POMERANZ
Rethinking comparative economic history: 'The East Asian development path' as concept, history and policy

Much literature normalizes a North Atlantic pattern of development, and sees a regionally specific 'East Asian' path emerging in the twentieth century. However, development patterns and economic performance in core regions of Europe and East Asia were surprisingly similar until almost 1800; Europe's divergence thereafter was shaped by exceptional resource bonanzas. East Asian growth has been less resource-intensive, more focused on light industry and a diversified rural economy, and based on different social ideas. However, one cannot always distinguish 'Eastern' and 'Western' paths cleanly: some European economies have followed what looks like an 'East Asian' path, and vice versa. Moreover, various East Asian states have had shorter periods in which their economic strategies focused on the capital-intensive, resource-intensive heavy industry that has otherwise been more prominent in the West: this has happened during periods when those states placed a high priority on increasing their military strength. Recently, 'East Asian' growth has spread to coastal China, but China’s interior poses greater challenges; current interest in more resource-intensive, state-centered development strategies for those regions (which are often related to fears about dependence on the outside world for resources) is thus unsurprising, but environmentally and socially risky.

Ryoichi YASUKUNI
Mining development and forest utilization: a case study of Besshi copper mine

Besshi copper mine was well known as a major Japanese copper mine from the close of the seventeenth century, and its copper was an important export article in the Edo period (1600~1867). The purpose of this paper is to examine the use of forest resources and the nature of forest management in relation to the mine, and the type of changes which occurred.

In the Edo period, it was important for those managing mines to secure supplies of wood for fuel. Copper mines mainly used wood for mine timber and for smelting fuel (charcoal and firewood). Wood for the Besshi mine was procured from the surrounding forests, which were rented from the Tokugawa shogunate, but as development of the mine proceeded, the amount of land required grew. They supplemented their sources of charcoal and timber by renting the forested lands belonging to nearby daimyo [feudal lords].

When the output of copper was increased in the 1880s, there was a critical shortage of wood for fuel owing to excessive felling. Before long, coal and coke became the main fuel source, but there was a rising demand for timber for tunnel extensions and the strengthening of mine cavities. Large-scale afforestation began, and the firewood forests around the copper mine developed into timber forests, in order to prepare for the demand for timber in the future.

Hiromichi TAKITA
The shift to fossil fuels in eighteenth- and nineteenth-century Germany: a contribution to the 'shortage of firewood' debate

The shift from firewood to coal in Germany has been linked to the shortage of firewood, which grew worse from the second half of the eighteenth century. However, the rapid development of environmental history since the 'oil shocks' of the 1970s has encouraged historians to revise this thesis. Here the author will comment on the two keynote speeches in relation to the 'shortage of firewood' debate.

In the first and second sections, we follow Joachim RADKAU's approach in order to show where the debate stands today: The transition to fossil energy proceeded less smoothly in Germany than in England. However, the cause is now thought to be not technical factors, as was previously claimed, but fundamental socio-economic changes summed up as the 'penetration of a new view of nature as an economic resource'.

In the third section, we examine the communal forest management of Siegerland in the eighteenth century, comparing it with the case of the Besshi copper mine, and discuss the merits and demerits of the introduction of modern techniques of forest management. In the last section, we use RADKAU's concept of a 'distinctively European path in environmental history' to end with an appeal for a bilateral approach combining global history and regional based total history.

Haruka YANAGISAWA
The changing socio-economic structure of Indian villages and the decline in elite control of resources: changes in the use of common lands in south Indian villages over the past hundred years

In nineteenth-century Tamilnadu (south India), a significant portion of village lands were not used by villagers for cultivation but for grazing, and as sources of firewood, fodder, manure and so on. However, since then there has been a rapid decrease in the overall area of such common land (wasteland).

In the nineteenth century, the dominant villagers not only owned the major portion of agricultural lands but also controlled the management of village common lands and had a preferential right to occupy and privatize wasteland. However, this elite dominance started to decline at the end of the century. Some of the landless villagers acquired small bits of farmland and in the 1920s they probably started occupying wasteland for cultivation purposes. This reclamation of wastelands by the landless reflected the declining dominance of the elite and the empowerment of the labouring classes even though it also reduced the overall area of common land. This paper suggests that in the long term, the acquisition of lands by the landless may contribute to the preservation of natural resources by encouraging a more egalitarian system of control.

Takeshi NISHIMURA
The circulation of silver in British India, 1901~1913

This paper discusses the role of the government-minted silver rupee (the government rupee) in integrating local currency systems in British India into the gold exchange standard, through the examination of trade and monetary statistics.

After the closure of the mint for the free coinage of silver in 1893, the British Government of India attempted to replace silver coins by issuing notes all over India. But many people preferred the coins and were unwilling to accept the notes. In 1900, therefore, the government abandoned the plan and decided to resume production of the government rupee, the value of which was now fixed at 1s. 4d. per rupee.

In the early twentieth century, long-distance trade came to be increasingly linked to coastal and inland trade, and a vast amount of government rupees penetrated into the hinterland since this was the only currency acceptable to the entire population. The value of various local currencies came to be expressed in government rupees. In this way, most local currency systems were incorporated into the gold exchange standard, and therefore into the international gold standard. The circulation of the government rupee, with its value fixed to sterling, made this incorporation possible.