IRSH 55 (2010), Supplement, pp.
51–77 doi:10.
1017/S0020859010000490
r 2010 Internationaal Instituut voor Sociale Geschiedenis
The Mid-Atlantic Islands: A Theatre of Early
Modern Ecocide?
S T E F A N H A L I K O W S K I S M I T H
Department of History,...
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IRSH 55 (2010), Supplement, pp.
51–77 doi:10.
1017/S0020859010000490
r 2010 Internationaal Instituut voor Sociale Geschiedenis
The Mid-Atlantic Islands: A Theatre of Early
Modern Ecocide?
S T E F A N H A L I K O W S K I S M I T H
Department of History, Swansea University
E-mail: S.
Halikowski-Smith@swansea.
ac.
uk
SUMMARY: The Iberian rediscovery of the mid-Atlantic islands in the late Middle Ages
was accompanied by all kinds of utopian projections.
However, within a hundred
years, both human and animal populations were made extinct, and the rich forest
cover was rapidly depleted for cash-cropping industries, primarily sugar.
Historians
view the migration of the international sugar industry from the mid-Atlantic islands to
Brazil as an example of expanding economies of scale, but contemporary accounts
indicate what now might be called widespread ecocide as a major contributing factor.
This essay looks at the environmental ramifications of the sugar industry as well as
other cultures
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