Editing Environmental determinism (section)

=== Late-20th-century growth of neo-environmental determinism ===
Environmental determinism was revived in the late-twentieth century as neo-environmental determinism, a new term coined by the [[social science|social scientist]] and critic [[Andrew Sluyter]].<ref name="Sluyter 2003" /> Sluyter argues that neo-environmental determinism does not sufficiently break with its classical and imperial precursors.<ref name="Sluyter 2003" /> Others have argued that in a certain sense a [[Universal Darwinism|Darwinian]] approach to determinism is useful in shedding light on human nature.<ref>{{cite journal | last=Ruse | first=Michael | date=1987 | title=Darwinism and determinism | journal=Zygon | language=en | volume=22 | issue=4 | pages=419–442 | doi=10.1111/j.1467-9744.1987.tb00781.x | issn=1467-9744}}</ref>

Neo-environmental determinism examines how the physical environment predisposes societies and states towards particular trajectories of economic and political development. It explores how geographic and ecological forces influence [[state-building]], [[economic development]], and [[institutions]]. It also addresses fears surrounding the [[effects of global warming|effects of modern climate change]].<ref name="Matthews 2012">{{cite book | editor-last=Matthews | editor-first=John A. | editor-last2=Bartlein | editor-first2=Patrick J. | editor-last3=Briffa | editor-first3=Keith R. | editor-last4=Dawson | editor-first4=Alastair G. | editor-last5=De Vernal | editor-first5=Anne | editor-last6=Denham | editor-first6=Tim | editor-last7=Fritz | editor-first7=Sherilyn C. | editor-last8=Oldfied | editor-first8=Frank | date=2012-02-22 | title=The SAGE handbook of environmental change | volume=1 | publisher=Sage | isbn=978-0-85702-360-5 | oclc=779233283 | url=https://books.google.com/books?id=8lpzvGaEH68C}}</ref> [[Jared Diamond]] was influential in the resurgence of environmental determinism due to the popularity of his book ''[[Guns, Germs, and Steel]]'', which addresses the geographic origins of state formation prior to 1500 A.D.<ref name="Diamond1997GGS">{{cite book | last=Diamond | first=Jared | title=Guns, germs, and steel: The fates of human societies | url=https://archive.org/details/gunsgermssteelfa0000diam | url-access=registration | publisher=W.W. Norton & Company | date=March 1997 | isbn=978-0-393-03891-0}}</ref>

Neo-environmental determinism scholars debate how much the [[physical environment]] shapes economic and political [[institutions]]. Economic historians [[Stanley Engerman]] and [[Kenneth Sokoloff]] argue that [[factor endowments]] greatly affected "institutional" development in the Americas, by which they mean the tendency to more free (democratic, free market) or unfree (dictatorial, economically restrictive) regimes.

In contrast, [[Daron Acemoglu]], [[Simon Johnson (economist)|Simon Johnson]], and [[James A. Robinson (Harvard University)|James A. Robinson]] underscore that the geographic factors most influenced institutional development during early state formation and [[colonialism]]. They argue that geographic differences cannot explain economic growth disparities after 1500 A.D. directly, except through their effects on economic and political institutions.<ref name="Crown Business">{{cite book | last1=Acemoglu | first1=Daron | last2=Robinson | first2=James | title=Why nations fail: The origins of power, prosperity, and poverty | date=2012 | publisher=Crown Business | location=New York | isbn=978-0-307-71921-8 | pages=[https://archive.org/details/whynationsfailor00acem/page/1 1–546] | url=https://archive.org/details/whynationsfailor00acem/page/1}}</ref>

Economists [[Jeffrey Sachs]] and [[John Luke Gallup]] have examined the direct impacts of geographic and climatic factors on economic development, especially the role of geography on the cost of trade and access to markets, the disease environment, and agricultural productivity.<ref name="Geography and Economic Development">{{cite journal | last=Gallup | first=John Luke | last2=Sachs | first2=Jeffrey D. | last3=Mellinger | first3=Andrew D. | title=Geography and economic development | journal=International Regional Science Review | volume=22 | issue=2 | date=August 1999 | issn=0160-0176 | pages=179–232 | doi=10.1177/016001799761012334 | bibcode=1999IRSRv..22..179G | s2cid=11559764 | url=https://www.hks.harvard.edu/sites/default/files/centers/cid/files/publications/faculty-working-papers/001.pdf}}</ref>

The contemporary [[global warming]] crisis has also impacted environmental determinism scholarship. [[Jared Diamond]] draws similarities between the [[Climate change (general concept)|changing climate conditions]] that brought down the [[Easter Island]] civilization and modern [[global warming]] in his book ''[[Collapse: How Societies Choose to Fail or Succeed]]''.<ref>{{cite book | last1=Diamond | first1=Jared | title=Collapse: How societies choose to fail or succeed | date=January 4, 2011 | publisher=Penguin Group | location=New York | isbn=978-0-14-027951-1 | pages=1–621}}</ref> Alan Kolata, Charles Ortloff, and Gerald Huag similarly describe the [[Tiwanaku empire]] and [[Maya civilization]] collapses as caused by climate events such as [[drought]].<ref>{{cite journal | last1=Kolata | first1=Alan L. | last2=Ortloff | first2=Charles | title=Thermal Analysis of Tiwanaku Raised Field Systems in the Lake Titicaca Basin of Bolivia | journal=Journal of Archaeological Science | date=October 1989 | volume=16 | issue=3 | pages=233–263 | doi=10.1016/0305-4403(89)90004-6 | bibcode=1989JArSc..16..233K}}</ref><ref>{{cite journal | last1=Huag | first1=Gerald | title=Climate and the collapse of Maya civilization | journal=Science | date=March 2003 | volume=299 | issue=5613 | pages=1731–1735 | doi=10.1126/science.1080444 | pmid=12637744 | bibcode=2003Sci...299.1731H | s2cid=128596188}}</ref> Peter deMenocal, Just as the earthworks in the deserts of the west grew out of notions of landscape painting, the growth of public art stimulated artists to engage the urban landscape as another environment and also as a platform to engage ideas and concepts about the environment to a larger audience. A scientist at the [[Lamont–Doherty Earth Observatory]] at [[Columbia University]], writes that [[societal collapse]] due to climate change is possible today.<ref>{{cite journal | last1=deMenocal | first1=Peter B. | title=African climate change and faunal evolution during the Pliocene-Pleistocene | journal=Earth and Planetary Science Letters | date=December 2003 | volume=220 | issue=1–2 | pages=3–24 | doi=10.1016/s0012-821x(04)00003-2 | doi-access=free}}</ref>