China: an environmental history

469 Pages·2017·8.492 MB·English

by  Marks, Robert

China
WORLD SOCIAL CHANGE
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China
An Environmental History
Second Edition
Robert B. Marks
ROWMAN & LITTLEFIELD
Lanham • Boulder • New York • London
Published by Rowman & Littlefield
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Copyright © 2017 by Rowman & Littlefield
First edition 2012.
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by
any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval
systems, without written permission from the publisher, except by a reviewer who
may quote passages in a review.
British Library Cataloguing in Publication Information Available
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Names: Marks, Robert, 1949– author.
Title: China : an environmental history / Robert B. Marks.
Description: Second edition. | Lanham : Rowman & Littlefield, 2017. | Series: World social
change | “First edition, 2012.” | Includes bibliographical references and index.
Identifiers: LCCN 2016044679 (print) | LCCN 2016044758 (ebook) | ISBN 9781442277878
(hardcover : alkaline paper) | ISBN 9781442277885 (paperback : alkaline paper) | ISBN
9781442277892 (ebook)
Subjects: LCSH: Human ecology—China—History. | Human geography—China—History.
| Nature—Effect of human beings on—China—History. | Social change—Environmental
aspects—China—History. | Environmental degradation—China—History. | Landscape
changes—China—History. | China—Environmental conditions.
Classification: LCC GF656 .M37 2017 (print) | LCC GF656 (ebook) | DDC 304.20951—dc23
LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2016044679
The paper used in this publication meets the minimum requirements of
American National Standard for Information Sciences—Permanence of Paper
for Printed Library Materials, ANSI/NISO Z39.48-1992.
Printed in the United States of America
Brief Contents
List of Illustrations xiii
Preface to the Second Edition xvii
Acknowledgments xxi
1 Introduction: Problems and Perspectives 1
2 China’s Natural Environment and Early Human Settlement to 1000 BCE 15
3 States, Wars, and Farms: Environmental Change in Ancient and
Early Imperial China, 1000 BCE–300 CE 65
4 Deforesting the North and Colonizing the South in the
Middle Imperial Period, 300–1300 CE 119
5 Empire and Environment: China’s Borderlands, Islands,
and Inner Peripheries in the Late Imperial Period, 1300–1800 CE 191
6 Environmental Degradation in Modern China, 1800–1949 257
7 “Controlling” Nature in the People’s Republic of China, 1949–Present 307
8 Conclusion: China and Its Environment in World Historical Perspective 393
Select Bibliography 413
Index 427
v

Contents
List of Illustrations xiii
Preface to the Second Edition xvii
Acknowledgments xxi
1 Introduction: Problems and Perspectives 1
Plan of the Book 8
2 China’s Natural Environment and Early Human Settlement to 1000 BCE 15
Natural Environment 16
Landforms 16
China’s Geographic Regions 18
Forests and Ecosystems 19
China’s Climate 22
Human Settlement and Pre-History 26
The Origins of Agriculture in China 27
Rice Environments in Central and South China 28
Malaria 32
The Yangzi River Valley 32
The Environment for Millet in North China 33
Nitrogen and Fertilizer 36
Summary 37
Prehistoric Environmental Change 38
The Formation of a Chinese Interaction Sphere, 4000–2000 BCE 43
Bronze-Age China: Technology and Environmental Change,
2000–1000 BCE 45
The Bronze-Age Shang State, 1500–1050 BCE 47
Anyang 48
Shang Social Organization 48
Domestication and Extinction of Wild Cattle 49
vii
viii Contents
Food 50
Shang “Civilization” and “Barbarian” Others 50
Environmental Change, 1500–1000 BCE 51
Energy Regime 55
Climate Change and the Fall of the Shang 56
Conclusion 57
3 States, Wars, and Farms: Environmental Change in Ancient
and Early Imperial China, 1000 BCE–300 CE 65
States, War, and Environmental Change in Ancient China,
ca. 1000–250 BCE 65
Nomadic Pastoralists of the Steppe 68
Other Non-Chinese Peoples 72
The Zhou Conquest: Colonies and Forests, 1050–750 BCE 73
Wars, Warring States, and the Creation of the First Empire,
750–200 BCE 77
Iron and Steel in Ancient China 79
War and the Use of Natural Resources 81
The Warring States and Non-Chinese Peoples 82
Pastoral Nomads and Nomadic Invaders 83
Summary 85
Environmental Change in the Early Empire, 221 BCE–220 CE 85
Han Colonialism, the End of the Xiongnu Steppe Nomads,
and the Beginnings of Desertification 87
Han Roads and the Opening of New Lands 90
Empire, Agriculture, and Deforestation 93
Water Control 96
The (Yellow) River 98
Cities and Eating 100
Imperial Hunting Parks 100
Summary 101
Ancient Chinese Ideas about Nature and the Environment 102
Confucius 104
Daoism 104
Later Confucians 105
Legalism 106
Resource Constraints and the Control of “Nature” 107
Epidemic Disease 108
The End of the Early Empire 109
Conclusion 110
4 Deforesting the North and Colonizing the South in the
Middle Imperial Period, 300–1300 CE 119
North China: War, Depopulation, and the Environment, 300–600 CE 122
Environmental Change in the Yangzi River Valley 127
Contents ix
Wet-Rice Cultivation 129
North and South Reunited in the Middle Empire: The Sui, Tang,
and Song Dynasties, 589–1279 CE 132
War and Water in Reuniting China under the Sui Dynasty (589–618) 134
The Grand Canal 135
Han Colonization of the South and Southeast 137
“South of the Mountains”: Lingnan 138
The Southeast Coast 142
Disease Regimes North and South 143
Malaria in the South 143
Contagious and Epidemic Disease in the North 146
New Agricultural Technologies and Environmental Change 148
Weeds and Fish 152
Technological Diffusion 153
Landed Estates 154
Buddhist Monasteries 154
Tang-Era Attitudes (and Actions) toward Nature 157
China’s Medieval Industrial Revolution 158
Colonizing Sichuan and Categorizing Others 162
Organizational Context 164
Chinese Views of “Barbarians” and Others 165
The “Cooked” and the “Raw” 165
Animals 165
Landscapes and Water “Control” 166
North China 166
Yellow River Water Control 168
Environmental Decline on the North China Plain, 1048–1128 170
South China: The Making of the Pearl River Delta 172
Flood Control 174
Fields Captured from the Sea 176
The Built Environment: Cities and Waste 177
An Urban Exemplar: Tang Chang’an 178
Waste, Sustainability, and Nutrient Cycles 181
Conclusion 183
5 Empire and Environment: China’s Borderlands, Islands,
and Inner Peripheries in the Late Imperial Period, 1300–1800 CE 191
A New Historical and Institutional Context 191
Population Size and Distribution 191
Markets 194
Climatic Changes 196
Frontiers and Borderlands 197
Environment and Identity 197
The Southwest 198
The Ordos Desert and the Great Wall 207
The Seventeenth-Century Crisis 210