Desert Edens: Colonial Climate Engineering in the Age of Anxiety

by Philipp Lehmann

Overview

How technological advances and colonial fears inspired utopian geoengineering projects during the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries

From the 1870s to the mid-twentieth century, European explorers, climatologists, colonial officials, and planners were avidly interested in large-scale projects that might actively alter the climate. Uncovering this history, Desert Edens looks at how arid environments and an increasing anxiety about climate in the colonial world shaped this upsurge in ideas about climate engineering. From notions about the transformation of deserts into forests to Nazi plans to influence the climates of war-torn areas, Philipp Lehmann puts the early climate change debate in its environmental, intellectual, and political context, and considers the ways this legacy reverberates in the present climate crisis.

Lehmann examines some of the most ambitious climate-engineering projects to emerge in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. Confronted with the Sahara in the 1870s, the French developed concepts for a flooding project that would lead to the creation of a man-made Sahara Sea. In the 1920s, German architect Herman Sörgel proposed damming the Mediterranean in order to geoengineer an Afro-European continent called “Atlantropa,” which would fit the needs of European settlers. Nazi designs were formulated to counteract the desertification of Eastern Europe and Central Asia. Despite ideological and technical differences, these projects all incorporated and developed climate change theories and vocabulary. They also combined expressions of an extreme environmental pessimism with a powerful technological optimism that continue to shape the contemporary moment.

Focusing on the intellectual roots, intended effects, and impact of early measures to modify the climate, Desert Edens investigates how the technological imagination can be inspired by pressing fears about the environment and civilization.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780691239347
Publisher:	Princeton University Press
Publication date:	12/17/2024
Series:	Histories of Economic Life , #9
Pages:	256
Product dimensions:	6.12(w) x 9.25(h) x (d)

About the Author

Philipp Lehmann is assistant professor of history at University of California, Riverside.

Table of Contents

Acknowledgments ix

Introduction: Climate Change and Changing Climates 1

1 A Science of Sand: The Sahara as Archive and Warning 13

2 Flooding the Desert: Roudaire's Sahara Sea Project 38

3 New Garden Edens: The Rise of Colonial Climate Engineering 53

4 A New Climate for a New Continent: Herman Sörgel's Atlantropa 72

5 Europe's Last Hope: Active Geopolitics and Cultural Decline 92

6 Slavic Steppes and German Gardens: Desertification in the Third Reich 115

7 Eastern Deserts: Climate and Genocide in the Generalplan Ost 135

8 Epilogue: Global Desertification and Global Warming 153

Notes 171

Archives 231

Index 233

What People are Saying About This

From the Publisher

“This impressively conceived and researched study is timely in several senses. Lehmann’s insightful historical analysis of European, especially German, responses to the challenges posed by what were perceived as expanding deserts provides illuminating context for current issues surrounding technology, development, and climate change, as well as those surrounding colonialism and decolonization. And it offers a sobering reminder of the hazards of political and intellectual hubris.”—Harriet Ritvo, author of The Dawn of Green: Manchester, Thirlmere, and Modern Environmentalism

“Lehmann explores the wilder shores of late nineteenth- and early twentieth-century techno-optimism, following the fevered dreams of French and German engineers, planners, and ideologues who proposed to geoengineer Africa and Asia to make them climatically appealing to European settlers. An incisive and revealing book at the intersection of intellectual, colonial, and environmental history.”—J. R. McNeill, author of Mosquito Empires

“Using an extraordinarily wide array of sources, Desert Edens narrates a fascinating tale that deserves to be told. Containing a tapestry of individuals, institutions, master plans, and future imaginaries, this book will resonate with historians of environmental science and environmental history.”—Vladimir Janković, author of Confronting the Climate

Editorial Reviews

"Finalist for the Turku Book Prize, European Society for Environmental History"

"Honorable Mention for the DAAD/GSA Prize for the Best Book in History / Social Sciences"

"Finalist for the Emory Elliott Book Awards"

From the Publisher