First Conference of East Asian Environmental History, 2011

The First Conference of East Asian Environmental History took place at Academia Sinica from October 24 to October 26, 2011. The conference committee invited Mark Elvin as one of the keynote speakers. Panels included Ph.D. students, researchers, and professors from across the globe. The conference was conducted in English. I got sick, and missed the third day.

It was an interesting conference. I listened to how environmental historians do history: with a focus on the impact of environment/landscape on history. The theme that emerged from the panels I attended was the relationship between the environment, animals, and humans. Some of them emphasized the equal role that environmental and human factors played in shaping history, without privileging the environment or human activity. For example, debates surrounding the success of the Chinese Communist Party and its eventual victory over the Chinese Nationalist Party (CCP) fluctuate bewteen two "extreme" interpretations: 1) Communists as sympathetic and helpful companions and/or Nationalists (KMT or GMD) as horrible rulers, or 2) the series of droughts and other natural disasters/climate change led to famine and other problems. Micah Muscolino from Georgetown University argues that it was both human factors (e.g. The Nationalist government flooded the Yellow River in 1938) and environment/climate factors (e.g. locust attacks and droughts) that led to famines and CCP's success.