The Sundarbans Forest Systems: Patterns of Colonial Control and Social Response to Capitalist Enterprises, c. 1830-1905

Abstract

Studies of the forest have received intense and varied attention in the past few decades, generating three major trends. One relates to the discourse of destruction of forest regimes. The intervention of colonial capital as well as pressure of population growth has been understood to be contributing to such destruction. Another theme is that of conservation which has highlighted the debates around the place of origin of conservation ideas and practices. Although the initial assumption was that conservation practices started in the USA in the nineteenth century, some historians have argued later that conservation policies and practices originated in the colonial world, where the destruction of the environment was most remarkable. Recently, particularly in South Asia, there have been important discussions on the intervention of the state in forest regimes and the resistance from forest dwellers. Seen in any way, the role of capital and the colonial state have been regarded as one of uninterrupted domination. While this proposition stands the test of empirical scrutiny in many respects, it blocks a more flexible reading of the varied development of capitalist intervention and colonial domination within a given ecological regime.