Theory of Knowledge - Course Companion for Students Marija Uzunova Dang Arvin Singh Uzunov Dang

I. Scope
administrative systems, had developed
and
cope with drought. Imperial rule actively
to
or dismantled these systems with
undermined
consequences. For example, the
devastating
in India who perished in the 1877
millions
did not die as a result of food shortages;
famine
that year, Indian grain exports to Britain
in
record numbers. Davis similarly shows
reached
Chinese government administrators were
how
at alleviating food shortages in times of
skilled
such that few people actually starved,
drought,
that this resilience was later devastated
but
Victorian imperialism, leaving millions
through
perish in subsequent droughts.
to
El Niño event of 1743–44 was described as
The
in its impact on the plains of north
exceptional
“The spring monsoon failed two years
China.
a row, devastating winter wheat … scorching
in
withered crops and farmers dropped
winds
in their fields from sunstroke. Provincial
dead
supplies were utterly inadequate …”
grain
2001). Yet unlike later droughts, there
(Davis
the skillful leadership of the Confucian
Under
great stores of grain were
administration,
to affected areas, using ships where
mobilized
The administrators brought in
necessary.
of the relief grain from stores outside
85%
area of drought. This sustained two
the
peasants for eight months until the
million
normalized and agriculture resumed,
weather
extraordinary act “no contemporary
an
society guaranteed subsistence as
European
human right to its peasantry …” (Davis
a
and nor did any have the capacity to
2001)
so like this. Indeed, while the Chinese
do
were saved from starvation by their
peasants
millions of Europeans were
administration,
from famineand hunger-related diseases
dying
freezing winters and summer
following
between 1740 and 1743. As Davis is
droughts
to point out, this famine-defence was
careful
an isolated case, and not even the most
not
There were five other El Niño
impressive.
and seven other flood disasters in that
disasters
Each time, the disaster relief was swift
century.
extensive, unlike the responses in later
and
capacity in eighteenth-century China
“State
was deeply impressive”, says Davis, with
…
administrators, a unique system
skilled
stabilize grain prices (overseen by the
to
himself), large and well-managed
Emperor
stores, and “incomparable hydraulic
grain
and canals (Davis 2001). The
infrastructures”
that the Emperor was personally involved
fact
to accuracy in reporting and more frequent
led
disaster relief was politics, at least
innovation;
China. Contemporary European monarchs
in
by comparison much less interested in the
were
droughts of the next century, in 1876 and
The
would not have caused millions of deaths
1899,
not for imperial intervention. Unlike in 1744,
if
administrators did not benefit from
these
maintained budget surpluses and
deliberately
reserves of grain. The difference, Davis
large
was that the Chinese state in 1876 had
asserts,
“enfeebled and demoralized”, and the
been
relief efforts reduced to cash relief and
disaster
foreign charity” (Davis 2001). The
“humiliating
of the El Niño cycle was an important
intensity
but so too was the dismantling of the
factor,
institutional and technical means for
social,
with that risk. “India and China, in
coping
words, did not enter modern history as
other
helpless ‘lands of famine’ so universally
the
in the Western imagination” (Davis
enshrined
They were enfeebled by Victorian
2001).
and the loss of sovereignty. To
imperialism
how, you will have to read Davis’s book.
learn
Is it possible to make politically neutral
1.
about the causes and consequences
claims
What types of claims about disasters can
2.
be free of politics?
never
How is this example similar to or different
3.
the way we speak about the climate
from
2
years, such as 1877, 1899, and 1958–61.
Bad climate versus bad system
minutiae of grain prices and famineprevention.
was no mass starvation.
Consider the following questions.
of huge natural disasters?
crisis today?
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