The Social History of Agriculture

From the Origins to the Current Crisis

By (author) Christopher Isett, Stephen Miller

Publication date:

11 November 2016

Length of book:

422 pages

Publisher

Rowman & Littlefield Publishers

Dimensions:

239x158mm
6x9"

ISBN-13: 9781442209664

This innovative text provides a compelling narrative world history through the lens of food and farmers. Tracing the history of agriculture from earliest times to the present, Christopher Isett and Stephen Millerargue that people, rather than markets, have been the primary agents of agricultural change. Exploring the actions taken by individuals and groups over time and analyzing their activities in the wider contexts of markets, states, wars, the environment, population increase, and similar factors, the authors emphasize how larger social and political forces inform decisions and lead to different technological outcomes. Both farmers and elites responded in ways that impeded economic development. Farmers, when able to trade with towns, used the revenue to gain more land and security. Elites used commercial opportunities to accumulate military power and slaves. The book explores these tendencies through rich case studies of ancient China; precolonial South America; early-modern France, England, and Japan; New World slavery; colonial Taiwan; socialist Cuba; and many other periods and places. Readers will understand how the promises and problems of contemporary agriculture are not simply technologically derived but are the outcomes of decisions and choices people have made and continue to make.

Introduction
Chapter 1: Settled Agriculture: The Ancient Origins of Community, State, and Empire
Chapter 2: From Antiquity to the Eve of Agrarian Capitalism: Peasants and Dynastic States
Chapter 3: Agrarian Capitalism in the Early Modern World: Divergence in Eurasia
Chapter 4: Malthusian Limits in the Early Modern World: Peasants and Markets
Chapter 5: The New World: Planters, Slaves, and Sugar
Chapter 6: American Farming: Agrarian Roots of U.S. Capitalism
Chapter 7: New Imperialism: Colonial Agriculture in the Age of Capitalism
Chapter 8: Socialist Agriculture: Collectivization in Three Countries
Chapter 9: Late Development: State-led Agrarian Change after World War II
Chapter 10: Corporate Agriculture: Comparing the United States and Brazil
Conclusion

An ambitious synthesis of twelve thousand years of world agricultural history. Through a social history approach that encompasses the study of political and economic systems, the authors contend that throughout history 'people’s choices of what to grow, the technologies to use, and the labor regime to employ are shaped by their societies.' Such an approach allows for a nuanced discussion of complex agricultural developments that expands this topic beyond an emphasis on market forces. . . . Through a comparative approach that maintains attention to detail and cultural difference, this book succeeds as a comprehensive narrative history of the development of agriculture. . . . Isett and Miller have written a history of world agriculture that successfully addresses key questions for different eras. Readers interested in world agriculture of the past and present will find this work insightful.