Abstract
The transformation of forests to agriculture is a dominant theme in human history, previously associated with progress, increasingly associated with local and global danger. A workshop at the Smithsonian Institution brought together scholars interested in one very large and fragile deltaic forest system of international importance: the Sundarbans. We found that land-hungry peasants are not quite the villain of the piece, as often portrayed; destruction and deterioration of the forest reflected pre-colonial dynamics of community and state formation, colonial land and forest policy, international economics, and failure to solve international commons dilemmas. Preservation of the remaining Sundarbans depends on profound shifts in values concerning nature as well as changes in political structure and national economic pressures. Conventional wisdom in the form of the “tragedy of the commons” in explaining environmental degradation stands in need of revision.
References
Paul Greenough, 1987, “Hunter's Drowned Land: Notes toward an Intellectual History of the Sunderbans,” Paper prepared for the Smithsonian/ACLS/SSRC Sundarbans Conference, Washington, D.C. November 20–21.
Garrett Hardin, 1968, “The Tragedy of the Commons,”Science pp. 1243–1248.
Karl Polanyi, 1944 (1956),The Great Transformation (New York: Farrar and Rhinehart).
Henry Yule and A. C. Burnell, 1903,Hobson-Jobson: A Glossary of Colloquial Anglo-Indian Words and Phrases, and of Kindred Terms, Etymological, Historical, Geographical and Discursive (Delhi: Munshiram Manoharlal, second edition, 1968).
Additional information
Ron Herring teaches political science at Northwestern University. His concern with environmental issues grew from work on village land systems, land reform and agriculture, some of which appearedas Land to the Tiller (Yale, 1983). He is currently organizing work on the environment through the SSRC.
Rights and permissions
About this article
Cite this article
Herring, R.J. Editor's introduction forests, peasants, and state: Values and policy. Agric Hum Values 7, 2–5 (1990). https://doi.org/10.1007/BF01530431
Issue Date:
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/BF01530431