Late Victorian Holocausts: El Niño Famines and the Making of the Third World

Introductory Paragraph

Late Victorian Holocausts: El Niño Famines and the Making of the Third World is an award-winning environmental and economic history published in 2001 by historian Mike Davis. Davis studies the causes and impacts of three interconnected drought-famines that impacted South America, South and Southeast Asia, and East Asia during the late 19th century. He suggests that colonial administrations were largely responsible for the devastation these droughts caused: Their policies of extraction left local populations newly vulnerable to crop failures, and the relief they offered was insufficient and tied to punitive work requirements. When imperial authorities did make relief available, it was contingent on famine victims’ ability to provide labor. Environmental determinism alone does not explain these events of the late 19th century. Political ecology illuminates the reasons for these catastrophes. Capitalism and imperialism worsened these natural crises, according to Davis, and gave rise to an impoverished “third world” that persists today. The book made the Los Angeles Times 2001 Best Books list and won the World History Association’s annual book award in 2002.

This guide uses the 2017 paperback edition published by Verso.

Content Warning: This book discusses topics that some readers may find unsettling, including genocide, starvation, and cannibalism.