Winners and Losers in Nature’s Cycle

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“Transformation,” “Control,” “Struggle,” “Law,” “Depleted” and “Fouled.” For this week’s reading Ted Steinberg uses these words in his chapter titles which he splits  into three parts with headings such as “Origins,” “Maturation,” and “Decline,” no doubt a cyclical connotation behind the use of those words. Steinberg argues that nature has been disregarded in historical discussions about industrial transformation. In many recent class discussions it has been suggested that until recently nature held the backseat to analyses of several major historical events. Even though nature proved more and more essential to the economy, historians and have tended to think of them as being less related than they actually were (and are).

Steinberg states, “Human history is defined by the transformation and control of nature” (12). With increased obsessions about capitalism came an increase in human need to control the environment. Steinberg suggests that prior to the nineteenth century it was more difficult for humans to commodify and privatize water than land. It was not easily subjected to ownership. With time came progress and better methods and thus water came to be controlled in much the same way as land. According to Steinberg with the nineteenth century came this notion that, “Industrial capitalism is as much a battle over nature as it is over work, as likely to result in strife involving water or land as wages or hours” (16). Nature and human control over it was just as important as the common components of an industrial society embedded in a capitalist economy.

Steinberg sets up a framework of “winners” and “losers.” Prior to the nineteenth century water was not controlled. With the emergence of industry came the need to control water and use its power. As Chelsea said last week, “Nineteenth-century Americans assumed that they could take control of nature and succeed in achieving their goals.” By most standards nineteenth-century Americans did succeed, but with a closer examination a different argument could be made, one suggesting they did not succeed. Industrialization consumed Americans’ lives. Industrialists felt a need to control not only the business world but the natural world as well.

Humanity was not “winning” prior to  the 1800s, it won during the 1800s/until the mid-1900s, but what about today, the twentieth century? I would argue that in this current cycle of human vs. nature, humanity is the loser and nature is the winner. Today’s society is bares the consequences of actions committed in the nineteenth century, actions that viewed water and land as necessary to success and malleable to meet any need. While nineteenth-century industrialists thought it crucial and keen to build factories and towns near water, is it possible that such actions hurt society more than it helped?