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Peter B. Lavelle uses the life and career of the statesman Zuo Zongtang as a lens to explore the environmental history of nineteenth-century China.
The Profits of Nature offers a new approach to understanding the dynamic relationship between imperial crisis, natural resources, and colonial development during a critical juncture in Chinese history.
List of contents
Conventions and Measures
Introduction
1. Agriculture in an Era of Crisis
2. Geography in a Growing Empire
3. Reclaiming the Land
4. Promoting Profitable Crops
5. Water in a Fertile Frontier
6. Sericulture in a Colonial Borderland
Conclusion
Acknowledgments
Chinese Terms
Abbreviations
Notes
Bibliography
Index
About the author
Peter B. Lavelle is assistant professor of history at Temple University.
Summary
In the nineteenth century, the Qing empire experienced a period of profound turmoil caused by an unprecedented conjunction of natural disasters, domestic rebellions, and foreign incursions. The imperial government responded to these calamities by introducing an array of new policies and institutions to bolster its power across its massive territories. In the process, Qing officials launched campaigns for natural resource development, seeking to take advantage of the unexploited lands, waters, and minerals of the empire’s vast hinterlands and borderlands.
In this book, Peter B. Lavelle uses the life and career of Chinese statesman Zuo Zongtang (1812–1885) as a lens to explore the environmental history of this era. Although known for his pacification campaigns against rebel movements, Zuo was at the forefront of the nineteenth-century quest for natural resources. Influenced by his knowledge of nature, geography, and technology, he created government bureaus and oversaw state-funded projects to improve agriculture, sericulture, and other industries in territories across the empire. His work forged new patterns of colonial development in the Qing empire’s northwest borderlands, including Xinjiang, at a time when other empires were scrambling to secure access to resources around the globe. Weaving a narrative across the span of Zuo’s lifetime, The Profits of Nature offers a unique approach to understanding the dynamic relationship among social crises, colonialism, and the natural world during a critical juncture in Chinese history, between the high tide of imperial power in the eighteenth century and the challenges of modern state-building in the twentieth century.
Additional text
Profits of Nature is an outstanding work that sheds new light on nineteenth century Chinese efforts to manage both manmade and natural disasters through the adoption of new technologies in agriculture, forestry, and industry, in the process transforming the heartland and borderlands of the empire. Lavelle’s groundbreaking book is a welcome contribution for Qing historians, historians of science and technology, and environmental studies.
