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IHDP

UPDATE

N E W S L E T T E R O F T H E I N T E R N AT I O N A L H U M A N D I M E N S I O N S P R O G R A M M E O N G LO B A L E N V I R O N M E N TA L C H A N G E

02/2005

ISSN 1727-155X

MODERN GLOBAL ENVIRONMENTAL HISTORY A Turbulent and Dramatic Scenario | B Y J OHN M C N EILL

FO CUS: ENVIRONMENTAL HISTORY

C

O N T E N T S

1 Modern Global Environmental

History: A Turbulent and Dramatic Scenario | John McNeill 4 Integrated History and Future of People on Earth (IHOPE) | Rik Leemans and Robert Costanza 6 A Socio-Ecological View on Industrialization in Europe since the 19th Century | Marina Fischer-Kowalski and Fridolin Krausmann 8 Africa’s Environmental History | Jane Carruthers 10 Bialowiez•a Primeval Forest: The Last Remnant of Pristine Woodlands Between Conservation and EcoTourism | Tomasz Samojlik 11 Disaster Coping and Prevention in the Swiss Alps in the Early 19th Century | Agnes Nienhaus ➤ In its time the earth has undergone many dramatic environmental shifts, from ice ages and hot spells to the emergence of new species and massive extinction spasms. Lately another historical moment of rapid environmental change has dawned, an era of environmental shock and awe, on this occasion brought on by the activities of a single species, the rogue primate homo sapiens sapiens. Humankind of course affected earth’s environment from the earliest moments of our career, and in thoroughgoing ways at least since the late Pleistocene megafauna extinctions. The intensity and scope of human impact upon the earth only grew with the transitions to agriculture that began roughly 11.000 years ago, and grew yet more with the initial harnessing of fossil fuels in the 18th century. But what has occurred in the past three or four human generations is novel in scale and scope, and in some respects, in character. Some forms of modern environmental change are totally new. Until 1930, there were no CFCs anywhere on earth (nor presumably anywhere else either). The earth’s protective layer of stratospheric ozone remained robust. But by the late 20th century, large quantities of CFCs had escaped to the stratosphere, significantly depleting the ozone shield. Until the first self-sustaining nuclear reaction in 1942 there were no nuclear wastes anywhere on earth, but within six decades there were millions of tons of them. But what makes the last century such an era of unusual environmental turbulence is more the scale and scope of venerable human practices such as farming and forest clearance, the use of fire and fuel, fishing and so forth. The following table gives a rough sense of the magnitude of some forms of environmental change over the last century. More data ➤

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12 Becoming Aware of the Seas’ Potential Richness | Interview with Poul Holm 14 From LTER to LTSER: The SocioEconomic Dimension of Long-Term Socio-Ecological Research | Helmut Haberl 16 Can Cities Reduce Global Warming? Urban Development and the Carbon Cycle in Latin America | Summary Report 18 The Challenge of Stabilizing Atmospheric CO2 Concentrations | Pep Canadell and Michael Raupach 20 Increasing IHDP’s Visibility Across the Globe | Debra Meyer-Wefering 21 In Brief 23 Meeting Calendar, Publications

W W W. I H D P. O R G I H D P U p d a t e i s p u b l i s h e d b y t h e I n t e r n a t i o n a l H u m a n D i m e n s i o n s P r o g r a m m e o n G l o b a l E n v i r o m e n t a l C h a n g e ( I H D P ) , Wa l t e r - F l e x - S t r. 3 , 5 3 1 1 3 B o n n , G e r m a n y, V. i . S . d. P. : U l a L ö w


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