Geography, Empire, and Environmental Determinism

Abstract

This article explores the relationship among geography, environmental determinism, and early-twentieth-century development of the Panama Canal Zone. The apparent scientific basis of environmental determinism provided both American policymakers and American Canal Zone residents with an acceptable explanation and rationalization for imperialism in Panama. On the basis of the thesis's academic trappings, everything from pay, privileges, racial hierarchy, and spatial patterns of housing to social control could be understood in ostensibly objective terms. Interpreting Panama through the theoretical lens of environmental determinism offers insights into the character of American prejudices and interests abroad. GEOGRAPHY, empire, and environmental determinism went hand in hand during the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. To illustrate the intertwining, this article analyzes the relationships between the accepted premises of early-twentieth-century American geography and the development of the Panama Canal Zone, specifically its residential areas that were home to most of the zone's 30,000 inhabitants. The characteristics of these archetypal American imperial landscapes are related to academic, social, and political contexts and to the geographical ideas associated with environmental determinism. Evidence from the Panama Canal Commission archives reveals how environmental determinism affected life in the Canal Zone and its landscapes; furthermore, the use of environmental determinism was modified over time to meet the changing circumstances on the isthmus. The characteristic language of environmental determinism appears time and again throughout the historical record of the Canal Zone. Additionally, environmental determinism itself encompasses a variety of discourses; ideas that now might be labeled as racism, imperialism, and geopolitics were subsumed in its theoretical confines. ENVIRONMENTAL DETERMINISM Environmental determinism originated as a set of ideas introduced into the mainstream of American geographical thought and practice by Ellen C. Semple (1911), on the basis of her selective interpretation of Friedrich Ratzel's nature-culture relationship (James and Martin 1981, 170, 304-307). In that relationship, the environment affects all aspects of social and economic de* I thank John Western and John Agnew for their generous and constructive criticism of the manuscript. * MR. FRENKEL is a doctoral student in geography at Syracuse University, Syracuse, New York 13244-1160. This content downloaded from 157.55.39.144 on Wed, 07 Sep 2016 04:44:36 UTC All use subject to http://about.jstor.org/terms THE GEOGRAPHICAL REVIEW velopment. Though often treated as part of geography's distant and shameful past, for half a century environmental determinism provided many students of society, not only geographers, with a theoretical guide for generalizing about the world. Environmental determinism was popularized at a time of real change in academic geography, when the discipline was shifting from a focus on exploration to intensive survey and philosophic synthesis, to quote Sir Halford Mackinder (1904, 421). Environmental determinism seemed to offer early-twentieth-century geographers a scientific foundation for theories by which it was possible to understand how people lived and acted in a changing world. The framework of environmental determinism allowed linkage of climatic conditions and other aspects of the physical environment to virtually everything, from culture, regional character, and political organization to the rise of civilization (Huntington papers). The thesis that northern Europeans were energetic, provident, serious, thoughtful rather than emotional, cautious rather than impulsive (Semple 1911, 620) assumed scientific authority. Likewise, the destiny of any society or economy could be predicted by mapping isotherms and humidity. By the mid-1920s, these ideas had lost much of their academic currency; outside universities and colleges, however, they retained considerable influence, perhaps a result of their apparent commonsensical nature. Environmental determinism seemed to fit Panama, in part because the tropical climate, flora, and fauna were considered unhealthy for residents of European origin. Those perceptions matched the opinions of visitors. Real dangers and discomforts were encountered and provided the empirical validation for theoretical environmental constructs. For example, only in the first decade of the twentieth century were the etiologies of malaria and yellow fever accurately known. The tropical heat made physical labor difficult, and life in the tropics before air-conditioning was enervating. The apparent logic of environmental determinism is less understandable for cultural and racial matters. The thesis gave authoritative credibility to the scientific racism of the time (Fredrickson 1981, 188). Environmental determinism provided an acceptable expression of otherwise contentious ideas. When monthly meetings of the Ku Klux Klan were banned from Canal Zone buildings in 1924, the reason was that the Klan's spirit is generally believed to be inimical to certain classes of our citizens on account o[f] their race or creed (PCC 13 L 14/1924). Yet the same ideas, expressed under the guise of environmental determinism, were tolerated and even bolstered American conclusions about