Global histories of empire and climate in the Anthropocene

Abstract

AbstractThe scientific consensus on the causes of climate change has galvanised global history in the Anthropocene. Within this expanding subfield, however, many historians have afforded imperialism too little explanatory power. This reticence is partly attributable to the intellectual formation of the discipline itself, which long severed human from natural history. It is also due to the paleo‐biological scale of climate change and the related propagation of ‘species history’ by Dipesh Chakrabarty. Obscuring global asymmetries in responsibility for climate change, this approach has deflected attention from the intersections of imperialism and environmental degradation. This article surveys the historiography and methodological challenges of climate change, Chakrabarty's influence on Anthropocene scholarship, and critical responses by global historians. It also summarises recent global histories which have closely analysed the interconnections between empire and climate change, indicating a tipping point in global environmental historiography. These studies reveal intimate, necessarily longue durée linkages between the industrialisation, fossil‐fuel combustion, and exploitative socio‐political structures underpinning both imperialism and climate change.