.png)
The major story of our time is not the launch of artificial intelligence nor the contention in US politics, it is the continuing destruction of the environment, which compromises Earth's future. "The Burning Earth" chronicles the folly in the human search for freedom from nature that simultaneously erodes the conditions for life on Earth. This story is not new. Sunil Amrith traces humans' destruction of Earth's environment by documenting this malevolent practice from the 12th century to the present in readable, thought-provoking prose.
Shortly after the Magna Carta, nobles procured the "Charter of the Forest," guaranteeing them the freedom to plunder timber, land, and wild animals. Amrith relates countless incidents of greed by Spanish, Russian, Chinese, British, and other patricians to improve their quality of life and, in doing so, spoil the Earth's natural environment.
He recounts the rapid expansion of South Africa's gold mines, making investors flush while tailings from the mines ruin the affected land forever. He warns that humans have ignored the truth that freedom has "ecological preconditions." The environmentalist maintains that the Earth is in crisis because of "our inability to imagine kinship with other humans, let alone other species."
Amrith gives examples of humans treating nature as an exploitable resource throughout the narrative. Humans thought they were free of nature's constraints after the introduction of fossil fuels. They soon learned the detrimental effects of carbon emissions.
In 1976-77, India sterilized eight million people in a brutal approach to population control. A Parisian banker, Albert Kahn, invested in diamond mines in the 1920s and 30s. Before he died in 1940, Kahn commissioned a photographic archive of Earth "while there is still time."
Amrith's account of how the First and Second World Wars involved the mobilization not only of the military but of other natural resources presents a new definition of war as an irreversible shaping of the planet. He also offers stories demonstrating that migration is a consequence of environmental damage.
Amrith's stories are heartbreaking and, at times, overwhelming. He asks, "Will we continue to seek new frontiers to explore to satisfy human greed or finally redirect our ingenuity to an ethos of regeneration and repair?"
Historically detailed and with a global view, Sunil Amrith in "The Burning Earth" explores human freedom's dependence on the health of our environment. His insights and big-picture perspective make this a vital read for anyone interested in a sweeping look at environmental justice.
About the author: Sunil Amrith is the Renu and Anand Dhawan Professor of History at Yale University and a professor at the Yale School of the Environment. He is the author of five books and recipient of multiple awards, including a MacArthur Fellowship, a fellowship at the British Academy, and the 2024 Fukuoka Prize for preserving Asian culture.
Comments