Green imperialism: colonial expansion, tropical island Edens and the origins of environmentalism, 1600-1860

TLDR

Colonial enterprises in the 17th‑18th centuries—through Portuguese, Dutch, and English East India companies—shaped early environmental crises and conservation practices across tropical islands, integrating indigenous knowledge, Newtonian science, and state medical services to lay foundations for global environmentalism. The study concludes that colonial state mechanisms were instrumental in establishing the foundations of Western environmentalism. The book includes illustrations, acknowledgements, an introduction, a bibliography, and an index.

Abstract

List of illustrations Acknowledgements Introduction 1. Edens, islands and early empires 2. Indigenous knowledge and the significance of South-West India for Portuguese and Dutch constructions of tropical nature 3. The English and Dutch East India companies and the seventeenth-century environmental crisis in the colonies 4. Stephen Hales and some Newtonian antecedents of climatic environmentalism, 1700-1763 5. Protecting the climate of paradise: Pierre Poivre and the conservation of Mauritius under the ancien regime 6. Climate, conservation and Carib resistance: the British and the forests of the Eastern Caribbean, 1760-1800 7. The beginnings of global environmentalism: professional science, oceanic islands and the East India Company, 1768-1838 8. Diagnosing crisis: the East India Company medical services and the emergence of state conservationism in India, 1760-1857 Conclusion: the colonial state and the origins of western environmentalism Select bibliography, Index.