DATE: October 28, 2008

CONTACT: Jacob Hamblin, 864-656-5354
jhambli@clemson.edu

WRITER: Ross Norton, 864-656-4810
rnorton@clemson.edu

Clemson researcher on the trail of environmentalism’s origins

CLEMSON — Clemson University assistant professor of history Jacob Hamblin is on the trail of environmentalism’s origin. Hamblin thinks he may find it in a war that never happened.

Hamblin is delving into records in the United States and Europe, exploring how preparation for World War III, headlined by the United States and the Soviet Union, led to modern environmental science and awareness.

“Arming Mother Nature: Science, Technology and Environmental Security after World War II” is supported by $165,000 in grants from the National Science Foundation (NSF) Scholars Award.

“I’m exploring how the science of environmental warfare beginning in the 1940s influenced international policies of environmental security by the late 1970s,” Hamblin says. “It is fundamental to understanding how Cold War science has shaped the contemporary world.”

The environmental vulnerability of developing countries was discovered by early research on environmental warfare, Hamblin says. Countries like India, for example, were at risk because of their reliance on a single crop to sustain the population. Early research on how to exploit nature to cripple a nation would lead to efforts by international agencies on how to guard against those vulnerabilities.

Hamblin’s research examines the boundary between environmental warfare and environmental security during the Cold War.

“The research examines the ways in which Cold War strategies envisioned and used the natural environment,” said Thomas Kuehn, chair of the Clemson University department of history and geography. “This is an underappreciated dimension of the Cold War that has enormous implications in a world much more sensitive to environmental concerns about the impact of military and diplomatic polices.”

Kuehn says it is significant that a historian received a grant from the National Science Foundation, a national agency devoted to scientific research.

“Such grants from NSF are rare, but they are recognition of the fact that there are fundamental historical dimensions to current problems and policies,” Kuehn said.