Ecological Imperialism in Early Modern Spanish Narratives

Excavating the Environmental Conflicts of the Iberian Globalization

Ibáñez Aristondo, Miguel

How are the environmental conflicts of our time intertwined with the legacies of Spanish imperialism and early modern globalization? In this volume, Miguel Ibáñez Aristondo argues that to understand the historical ramifications of the ecological crisis, it is imperative to excavate the fragmented histories and bottom-up viewpoints associated with European imperialism. Drawing on early modern Iberian, Indigenous, and European sources, the book interrogates how early modern debates regarding war, free trade, abundance, wilderness, property, race, and sovereignty were deeply entangled within ideas and theories driving the relationship between humans and the environment. By exploring the heterogeneous and conflict-ridden experiences arising from Spanish imperialism, the book contends that the climate and ecological crises have engendered divergent visions and social strata over time, stemming from the uneven distribution of environmental conflicts spanning local, regional, and global scales.