Scorched Earth

Throughout history, humans have fought 3 out of every 4 wars to gain territorial control. But, just as often, wars have also witnessed combatants and civilians intentionally destroying that very territory over which they started a war. Why?

"Wars against Nature" will explore a behavior that is just as puzzling as it is recurrent: the deliberate destruction of the natural environment during wars. 

Comparing the occurrence of this behavior over time, from the Romans' decision to salt the soil in Carthage in 146BC to the targeting of dams in the Russian invasion of Ukraine in 2022/24, the book will ask why this type of destruction has persisted for so long and in so many different parts of the world. 

The book will draw on insights from diverse disciplines across various fields of study. It will draw from theories of primates' territorial control in biology, but also theories of emotions and short vs. long-term biases in psychology, as well as insights from history on the memorialization of conflict, international law understandings of environmental destruction, and theories of the causes and consequences of wars from political science and economics. This book will help us grapple with fundamental questions about human nature, our right to shape the environment around us for better or worse, and what we owe to future and past generations. 

The IR Lab @ Amherst College, which I direct, is working on this very project. 

Please email me if you want to connect on this project or see the latest version.