Over the past several decades, the environmental history of Latin America has emerged as a vibrant field. Historians have produced innovative studies exploring nature’s central role in Latin American history. Most of these studies, however, are local or regional in scope. Miller’s Environmental History of Latin America is an excellent synthesis of the literature, inflected by his own original and thoughtful analytical voice.
Miller traces the environmental history of Latin America from the eve of the European conquest to the present. The book’s unifying analytical theme is sustainability, in short, “whether the project of tropical civilization has been sustainable” (p. 3). Miller analyzes “four recurring themes: population, technology, attitudes towards nature, and attitudes towards consumption” (p. 4). The book’s treatment of precontact Amerindian societies carefully debunks the “Pristine Myth,” which argues that these societies lived in a purported equilibrium with their natural world. Miller replaces this myth with a more...
