Vol.
68, No. 6
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<Conference report>
Hiroshi KITO
Challenges to the economic history of the environment: forests, development,
markets
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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.
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Kenneth POMERANZ
Rethinking comparative economic history: 'The East Asian development
path' as concept, history and policy
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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.
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Ryoichi YASUKUNI
Mining development and forest utilization: a case study of Besshi copper
mine
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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.
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Hiromichi TAKITA
The shift to fossil fuels in eighteenth- and nineteenth-century Germany:
a contribution to the 'shortage of firewood' debate
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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.
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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
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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.
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Takeshi NISHIMURA
The circulation of silver in British India, 1901~1913
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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.
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