Preface to the Second Edition x
Acknowledgments xiii
1 Human Agency and the State of the Earth 1
Introduction 1
Can One Conceive of Ecosystems Without Human Agents? 11
Human Agency: Individuals Making a Difference 14
Overwhelming Evidence for Concern with the Condition of the Earth System 17
Looking Back and Looking Forward 26
Additional Resources 27
References 28
2 A Reminder: How Things Were... 33
The Study of Human Ecological Relations 33
The Contemporary Study of Environmental Issues: The Rise of Cross-Disciplinary Team-Based Approaches 39
The Evolution of Human-Environment Interactions 47
Hunter-Gatherers: Setting Our Preferences 52
How Did We Decide to Become Farmers? 56
Herding and Farming: An Uneasy Relationship 59
More Food for the Masses 61
Additional Resources 64
References 64
3 The Great Forgetting 75
Earth Transformations in Prehistory 75
The Archeology of Environmental Change 83
The Urban-Industrial Revolution and the Unleashing of Prometheus 86
The Contemporary Situation: Human-Dominated Ecosystems 89
Additional Resources 91
References 92
4 The Web of Life: Are We in it? 96
The Web of Life and Trophic Relations: Thinking Ecologically 96
Ecosystem Productivity and Net Primary Production 103
Land Use and Long-Term Disturbance 105
Additional Resources 117
References 117
5 What Makes People Do That? 122
Learning, Adaptation, and Information 122
Mitigation and the Cautionary Principle 135
Transforming the Face of the Earth: Making Better Decisions 136
Additional Resources 139
References 140
6 Population and Environment 145
Theories about Population 146
The Demographic Transition 147
Aging and International Flows of Labor 150
Addressing the Needs of 10 Billion People 153
Changing the Population and Environment Nexus 159
Additional Resources 162
References 163
7 Rebuilding Communities and Institutions 166
Community in Human Evolution 166
What is Sacred in Human Evolution? 169
Tragedies of the Commons 172
Institutions and Self-Organization 176
Bioregionalism, Deep Ecology, and Embedding People in Nature 180
Additional Resources 182
References 183
8 Can We Learn When We Have Enough? 188
Material Boys and Material Girls 188
Patterns of Consumption in Developed Countries 189
Patterns of Consumption in Developing Countries 196
A Feeding Frenzy and a Crisis in Public Health 200
Burning Fossil Fuels instead of Calories 202
Do We Have Enough Material Goods Now? 205
Additional Resources 207
References 208
9 Quality of Life: When Less is More 210
Resource Abundance versus Resource Scarcity 210
When Less is More 220
The Scale of the Problem and the Scale of the Solution 229
Restoring Our Balance: Valuing Community and Trust 233
Are We Happier When We Have More? 238
References 241
Index 244

Now updated and expanded, People and Nature is a lively, accessible introduction to environmental anthropology that focuses on the interactions between people, culture, and nature around the world.
* Written by a respected scholar in environmental anthropology with a multi-disciplinary focus that also draws from geography, ecology, and environmental studies
* Addresses new issues of importance, including climate change, population change, the rise of the slow food and farm-to-table movements, and consumer-driven shifts in sustainability
* Explains key theoretical issues in the field, as well as the most important research, at a level appropriate for readers coming to the topic for the first time
* Discusses the challenges in ensuring a livable future for generations to come and explores solutions for correcting the damage already done to the environment
* Offers a powerful, hopeful future vision for improved relations between humans and nature that embraces the idea of community needs rather than consumption wants, and the importance of building trust as a foundation for a sustainable future