SOCIETY, TERRITORY AND ECOLOGY IN QUÉBEC :

A HISTORIOGRAPHIC REVIEW1

Stéphane CastonguayCanada Research Chair

in the Environmental History of Québec

Centre interuniversitaire d’études québécoisesUniversité du Québec à Trois-Rivières

“Environmental history,” “history of theenvironment” and “historical ecology” are allterms used to refer to a field of research thatsome people claim to be innovative or even

1. The author would like to thank Matthew D. Evenden,René Hardy, Michel Lacroix and Jean-Claude Robert for theircomments and suggestions.

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revolutionary. While the scope of the fieldvaries with historical practices, scholarsgenerally agree that “environmental history”designates the study, over time, of the mate-rial, political and intellectual dimensions ofthe interaction between society and the envi-ronment ; they emphasize that such studymust cover the evolution of each element ofthat pair, as well as the transformation of theirrelations.2 Thus defined, this field of researchprompts us to question the discourse on thenature of the actors studied and to attribute a

2. This definition is based on J. R. MCNEILL, “Obser-vations on the Nature and Culture of Environmental Histo-ry,” History and Theory, vol. 42, no. 1, 2003, pp. 5-43. For anoverview of the different possible definitions, see one of thefounding debates in the field in William CRONON, “Modes ofProphecy and Production : Placing Nature in History,” Jour-nal of American History, vol. 76, no. 4, 1990, pp. 1122-1131 ;Carolyn MERCHANT, “Gender and Environmental History,”Journal of American History, vol. 76, no. 4, 1990, pp. 1117-1121 ; Donald WORSTER, “Transformation of the Earth.Toward an Agroecological Perspective in History,” Journal ofAmerican History, vol. 76, no. 4, 1990, pp. 1087-1106.

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certain dynamic to the environment, which isoften reduced to an inert, passive backdrop forthe social changes, political struggles andheroic lives that historians usually examine.This requires showing how nature, in both itsmaterial forms and representations, is a powerissue and place of conflict, how space and itsnon-human actors limit the human actionthat shapes them, and how the resourcesfundamental to economic exchange remainmalleable to an extent determined by institu-tions and nature itself. This also requiresacknowledging that the environment – as wellas its biotic and abiotic elements – has its ownhistory, rhythm and cycles.

We have provided a broad and overarch-ing definition of environmental historybecause we consider that the field – like itsobject of study – is open, dynamic, complexand chaotic. We seek a broad perspective thatwill enable us to understand how research inQuébec studies can contribute to the environ-mental history of Québec.

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It may seem ambitious and premature toattempt a survey of works dealing with Qué-bec’s environmental history, particularly sincethe historians who have focused on Québecsociety do not necessarily consider theircontributions part of environmental history.A brief look at the United States and Europewill, however, show the relevance of thisapproach.

In the past few decades, environmentalhistory in the United States has acquired allthe signs of a distinct historiographic field : asociety that publishes a journal3 and holdsannual meetings, university positions andendowed chairs, handbooks and readers,university press series, specialized colloquia,

3. Presently titled Environmental History, the journal ofthe American Society for Environmental History and theForest History Society was created in 1996 through themerger of Environmental History Review (originally Environ-mental Review, 1976-1989) and Forest & Conservation History(Forest History, 1958-1974 and the Journal of Forest History,1974-1989).

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and collective works. The visibility of environ-mental history has legitimized the pioneeringwork of seasoned solitary scholars and openedup new careers for young researchers. Presti-gious historical journals have publishedspecial issues on environmental history. His-toriographic surveys have increased in num-ber, reflecting both the maturity of the fieldand its ability to integrate numerous fields ofhistorical study.4

A similar movement was initiated inEurope, where an international associationwas established and an international journal5was founded.6 One of the reasons Europeans

4. See the theme-based issues of the following journals :History and Theory, vol. 2, no. 1, pp. 5-43 ; Journal ofAmerican History vol. 76, no. 4, 1990, pp. 1122-1131 ; Journalof Urban History, vol. 20, no. 2, 1994, pp. 299-434 ; Journal ofHistorical Geography, vol. 20, no. 1, 1994, pp. 1-56 ; BusinessHistory Review, vol. 73, no. 4, 1999 ; Journal of the History ofBiology, vol. 31, no. 1, 1998, pp. 1-83.

5. Environment and History, founded in 1994.6. Verena WINIWARTER [ED.], “Environmental History in

Europe from 1994 to 2004. Enthusiasm and Consolidation,”Environment and History, vol. 10, no. 1, 2004, pp. 501–530.

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may have been able to jump on the environ-mental history bandwagon so quickly is thatthey have strong traditions in historicalgeography, urban history and historicalanthropology, which share similarities withenvironmental history as it is practiced in theUnited States. Climate, animals, landscape,forests, urban infrastructure, and the “idea ofnature” are a few of the topics in environ-mental history on which European resear-chers from all disciplines have focused inrecent decades.7 These researchers have taken

7. Even if we limit ourselves to the case of the French, wecan appreciate the diversity of the approaches and topics ofEuropean environmental history. See Emmanuel LEROY LA-DURIE, Histoire du climat depuis l’an mil, Paris, Flammarion,1967 ; Jean-Paul DELÉAGE, Histoire de l’écologie, une science del’homme et de la nature, Paris, La Découverte, 1991 ; Jean-Robert PITTE, Histoire du paysage français, Paris, Tallandier,1983 ; Robert DELORT, Les animaux ont une histoire, Paris,Seuil, 1984 ; Andrée CORVOL, L’homme aux bois. Histoire desrelations de l’homme et de la forêt XVIIe-XXe siècles, Paris,Fayard, 1987 ; Xavier de PLANHOL, Le paysage animal.L’homme et la grande faune. Une zoogéographie historique,

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an interest in this new field and developed ex-tensive networks for collaboration and com-parison. Furthermore, the specific character ofEuropean environmental history must benoted, as it bears the mark of natural scientistswho have produced exemplary studies on theenergy and material flow of societies in thecontext of agricultural, industrial and urbanrevolutions.8

I make this detour because I think that thesituation of Québec studies is not so different

Paris, Fayard, 2004 ; André GUILLERME, Les temps de l’eau. Lacité, l’eau et les techniques, Seyssel, Champs Vallon, 1983 ;Jean-Claude DEBEIR, Jean-Paul DELÉAGE et Daniel HEMERY,Les servitudes de la puissance. Une histoire de l’énergie, Paris,Flammarion, 1986.

8. Rolf-Peter SIEFERLE, The Subterranean Forest. EnergySystems and the Industrial Revolution, Cambridge, WhiteHorse Press, 2001. This mark can be seen from the first publi-cations of a self-conscious environmental history in Europe.Christian PFISTER and Peter BRIMBLECOMBE, [eds.], The SilentCountdown : Essays in European Environmental History,Berlin, Springer-Verlag, 1990.

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from that prevailing in Europe.9 The workproduced by historical geographers, social andeconomic historians, as well as researchers inurban studies and material culture provideshistorical and historiographic knowledgerelevant to environmental history. Anyoneventuring into this field will be able to drawvaluable information from various researchefforts carried out in Québec studies. Thus,positioning Québec in world environmentalhistory requires first that we assess the contri-bution Québec studies have made to analyseson the interaction between society and theenvironment in the 19th and 20th centuries.To this end, we will survey the scientific workon space and territory, the economics of natu-

9. The same is true of the situation of Canada andAustralia. See Graeme WYNN and Matthew D. EVENDEN, “IsThere, Was There, Should There Be a Canadian Environmen-tal History,” a presentation given at the annual conference ofthe Canadian Historical Association held in London, Ontarioin June 2004, and Libby ROBIN and Tom GRIFFITHS, “Envi-ronmental History in Australasia,” Environment and History,vol. 10, no. 1, 2004, pp. 439-474.

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ral resources, the urban environment, and thebiogeophysical environment.

In this survey, which is by no means ex-haustive, we will identify which “environ-ment” the authors discussed and on whichinteractions between society and the environ-ment they focused.10 The reader will not findhere a historiographic survey of Québec envi-ronmental history or a compendium of theprecursors of the field. Few of the authors sur-veyed would consider themselves as such andmany would distance themselves from whatthey would call fashion, post-modern adven-ture or disguised activism. We will take into

10. As a result of space limitations, we are unable toinclude fields such as Native Studies and Nordic Studies,which illustrate the significant contribution of anthropologyto our understanding of the links between society and nature.The reader can nonetheless refer to the article by DenysDELÂGE, “Microbes, animaux et eaux en Nouvelle-France,”Globe, vol. 9, no. 1, 2006. pp. 113-140, and that by CarolineDESBIENS, “Un nouveau chemin vers les rapides. Chisasibi/LaGrande et les relations nord-sud au Québec,” Globe, vol. 9,no. 1, 2006, pp. 177-210.

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account the context in which they producedtheir work and the type of relations withnature they highlight in their analyses. We willcertainly emphasize the contribution of thosewho do identify with this new field, being sureto indicate their perception of the contribu-tion of their precursors so that one can graspthe specificity of their questioning. Finally, wewill underline the main issues and challengesinvolved in the diachronic study of social andenvironmental changes in Québec.

HISTORICAL GEOGRAPHY :SETTLEMENT AND EXPLOITATION OF THE LAND

We have alluded already to the relation-ship between geography and environmentalhistory.11 We should not be surprised to see

11. For more on this link, see in particular the essay byMichael WILLIAMS, “The Relations of Environmental Historyand Historical Geography,” Journal of Historical Geography,vol. 20, no. 1, 1994, pp. 3-21 and the contributions in

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geography among the fields that have contri-buted to our historical knowledge of theinteraction between society and the environ-ment. The authors of recent reviews see thedistant origins of Canadian environmentalhistory in the geographic considerations ofthe first professional Canadian historians,even though they are careful to point out theshortcomings.12 While the history of staplesindicates how the availability of naturalresources and their geographic distributionmoulded the historical and economic deve-lopment of Canada, it provides few answersabout the role of human activity in shapingthe environment. The environment discussed

Marie-Claire ROBIC, Du milieu à l’environnement. Pratiques etreprésentations du rapport homme/nature depuis laRenaissance, Paris, Économica, 1992.

12. Neil S. FORKEY, Shaping the Upper Canadian Frontier :Environment, Society and Culture in Trent Valley, Calgary,University of Calgary Press, 2003, pp. 6-13 ; Matthew D.EVENDEN, Fish versus Power : An Environmental History of theFraser River, Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, 2004,pp. 10-11.

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in these works seems impervious to the acti-vity of a society that owed its growth and eco-nomic success to it. This approach does notaccount for the interaction between societyand the environment.

It is precisely a relational approach that isfound in historical geography, as practised forthe past two decades in Québec.13 Thesettlement and development of the land havebeen the primary focus of historical geogra-phy in Québec ; the Laurentian axis hasconstituted one of the main projects in thefield.14 The purpose of the project, directed bySerge Courville, Normand Séguin and Jean-

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13. For an overview of historical geography in Québec,see Claude BELLAVANCE and Marc SAINT-HILAIRE, “Le temps etl’espace comme catégories d’analyse chez les historiens et lesgéographes québécois (1984-2002),” Annales de Bretagne etdes Pays de l’Ouest, vol. 10, no. 4, 2003, pp. 13-53.

14. A general presentation of the project and initialfindings are provided in Serge COURVILLE, Jean-ClaudeROBERT and Normand SÉGUIN, Le pays laurentien au XIXe siècle,les morphologies de base, Sainte-Foy, Les Presses de l’Univer-sité Laval, “Atlas historique du Québec,” 1995.

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Claude Robert, was to spatially explore thesocio-economic development of the majorpopulation locus of Québec – that along theshores of the St. Lawrence River between Qué-bec City and Montréal, a territory endowedwith natural resources but shaped by humanactivity. This research focused on logging andfarming, which formed the basis of industrialactivity around which settlements developed,thus structuring the landscape, populationmovement and economy of the province.

Initiated in the wake of the historiogra-phic controversy surrounding the agriculturalcrisis during the second third of the 19thcentury,15 this project provides considerableinformation on the conditions under whichthe ecumene expanded and, in so doing,contributes to undermining the arguments ofproponents of the overpopulation of the

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15. On this controversy, see Serge COURVILLE, “La criseagricole du Bas-Canada. Éléments d’une réflexion géographi-que. Première partie,” Cahiers de géographie du Québec, vol.24, no. 62, 1980, pp. 193-224.

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St. Lawrence Lowlands. The studies conduct-ed as part of this project reveal, for example,changes in the conditions of Québec agri-culture, which became specialized in the mid-19th century : grain production moved to thefringes of the back country, making way forfood and feed production and thus providingfor the development of commercial single-crop farming and livestock production. Thestudies also show the dynamic of the concen-tration and migration of logging as well as theprogression of clearing. They provide a pic-ture of the action society took on the territoryover time, clearing forests, cultivating theland, creating transportation routes andharnessing rivers for industrial purposes.

By describing the commercial exchangesbetween frontier settlements, towns and citiesin Québec and the United States, these studiespinpoint the processes underlying the integra-tion of local economies. They discuss the cen-tres of socio-economic development in theirrelationship with the hinterland that vitalized

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them.16 They portray the conditions of shif-ting borders underlying the expansion of theexchange network and enabling commercialfarmers to meet the regional, continental andinternational needs of an increasinglyurbanized world. They provide a view of thecity and country coming together in a systemof two-way trade in which material circulated.The ecological costs and conditions of thismaterial flow, however, would require tho-rough study.

Whether the work produced in this pro-ject can be labelled environmental history isnot of concern. That issue was not on theagenda of these historical geographers. Whatis relevant is how their methods, approachesand answers elucidate the development andtransformation of the landscape. Because theproject brought together a large number of

16. Those familiar with the literature in environmentalhistory will see a close link with the flagship work of WilliamCRONON, Nature’s Metropolis. Chicago and the Great West,New York, Norton, 1991.

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researchers, it prompted numerous studies onthe landscape and its representation, resourcesand their exploitation, population shifts inrelation to the land, and exchange networksbetween urban areas and rural communities.Ultimately, elements of the environment wereshown in their relationship with society ins-tead of simply being presented as a backdropfor social and economic change.

The architects of this project produced agroup of studies which appeared in two col-lections of Les Presses de l’Université Laval :Atlas historique du Québec and Géographiehistorique. Two of the studies appearing inGéographie historique warrant specific atten-tion. The natural overlapping of historicalgeography and environmental history is mostclearly and deliberately expressed in Marsh-lands by Matthew Hatvany.17 Focusing on the

17. Matthew HATVANY, Marshlands : Four Centuries ofEnvironmental Change on the Shores of the St. Lawrence,Sainte-Foy, Les Presses de l’Université Laval, “Géographiehistorique,” 2003.

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construction of aboiteaux in the St. Lawrenceestuary, Hatvany examines the dynamic of therelationship between settlers of the Côte-du-Sud and the land, as well as the ecologicalissues, potential and tensions created by thediking of the Kamouraska salt marshes. Em-phasizing the contribution of local knowledgeto an understanding of ecosystems and theirtransformation, his study concentrates on thematerial dimension of society’s relationshipwith nature and the shaping of representa-tions of the environment.

In addition to providing information onthe settlement and improvement of Québeclands, historical geography strives to takerepresentations of the land into account andto clarify the meaning of the relationshipbetween social actors and space over time.18 Inher work Paysage, mythe et territorialité, Linda

18. Linda VILLENEUVE, Paysage, mythe et territorialité.Charlevoix au XIXe siècle. Pour une nouvelle approche dupaysage, Sainte-Foy, Les Presses de l’Université Laval,“Géographie historique,” 1999.

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Villeneuve examines the effects an identity-based representation – resulting from the pro-jection of imported ideologies – on thelandscape. Her analysis of the changes in theCharlevoix landscape during the 19th centuryreveals a close association between the mate-rial forms and representations of the land-scape, and the actual links between humansand the land. The wild and romantic nature ofthe landscape, people’s healthy and virtuousway of life, their religious fervour and theirsimplicity constitute the typical values andcultural features of French Canadians living inCharlevoix, as portrayed by nationalisticmythology. This work shows the discrepancybetween the functions etched in the landscapeand the material world that representationsconceal, whether deliberately or not, and howthe environment is thus infused ideologicallyin its material dimension.19

19. From a cultural history perspective, the study of thetransformation of the landscape by Colin Coates is both

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BUSINESS AND LABOUR HISTORY :THE SOCIO-ECONOMICS OF NATURAL RESOURCES

Just as Canadian historians have concen-trated on staples, Québec historians have fo-cused on the exploitation of natural resources.In fact, many refuse to grant any originality toenvironmental history because Québec histo-rical works have dealt so intrinscially with thistopic. While the preceding section indicatesthat natural resources were central to theinhabited and improved territory, this sectionwill discuss studies in which geography issecondary to social and economic history

stimulating and relevant to environmental history (ColinCOATES, The Metamorphoses of Landscape and Community inearly Quebec, Montreal and Kingston, McGill-Queen’sUniversity Press, 2000). In this work, Coates examines therecreation of life and landscapes from England in the areaaround the Batiscan and Sainte-Anne rivers by the Britishimmigrant population. The landscape is both an ecologicalregion and the cultural moulding of a physical space.

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studies, which highlight the world of enter-prises and workers.20

Forests constitute an excellent startingpoint, since they are at the root of the conser-vation movement in North America and arethe subject of several works in environmentalhistory.21 A striking fact in the history ofQuébec forests is the simultaneous transitionfrom white pine harvesting and the lumberindustry to spruce harvesting and the pulpand paper industry. Self-professed environ-mental historians – scholars like Peter Gillis,Thomas Roach and Michel Girard – based aportion of their work on institutions which, inQuébec, oversaw this transition between the

20. The atlas Le territoire includes chapters on each of thenatural resources discussed here. Each chapter ends withenvironmental considerations as yet to be treated historically(Claude BOUDREAU, Serge COURVILLE and Normand SÉGUIN

[eds.], Le territoire, Sainte-Foy, Les Presses de l’UniversitéLaval, “Atlas historique du Québec,” 1997.)

21. To name only one and the first of its kind, Samuel P.HAYS, Conservation and the Gospel of Efficiency, Cambridge,Harvard University Press, 1959.

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end of the 19th century and the middle of the20th century.22 Picking up on and sometimeschallenging the theses of Samuel P. Hays onthe conservation movement and the centralrole of government expertise in its develop-ment, these historians placed little importanceon the material basis of discourse on thedepletion of wood resources.23 Curiouslyenough, it was social historians who, withoutnecessarily claiming to analyze the evolutionof the interaction between society and the en-vironment, explored the form and content ofthe forest and not only its discursive enact-ment. These historians include René Hardy

22. R. Peter GILLIS and Thomas R. ROACH, Lost Initiatives.Canada’s Forest Industries, Forest Policy and Forest Conserva-tion, New York, Greenwood Press, 1986 ; Michel F. GIRARD,La forêt dénaturée. Les discours sur la conservation de la forêtquébécoise au tournant du XXe siècle, Master’s thesis, Depart-ment of History, University of Ottawa, 1988.

23. Michel GIRARD, “Conservation and the Gospel ofEfficiency : un modèle de gestion de l’environnement venud’Europe,” Histoire sociale/Social History, vol. 33, no. 45,1990, pp. 63-79.

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and Normand Séguin, who questioned the re-percussions of this transition on the develop-ment of forestry potential and on the vegeta-tion cover, particularly with respect to the in-cidence of forest fires and insect infestations.24

Hardy further developed this line of thinkingin an article on representations of the forest inrelation to the transformation of the vegeta-tion cover. His acknowledgement of the eco-nomic, symbolic and ecological dimensions ofthe forest sets his contribution apart fromthose of recognized Canadian environmentalhistorians.25

Forest history also includes a socialcomponent, which historians have examined,taking a particular interest in workers andtheir exploitation. The above-mentioned

24. René HARDY and Normand SÉGUIN, Forêt et société enMauricie. La formation de la région de Trois-Rivières 1830-1930, Montreal, Boréal, 1984, pp. 72-87.

25. René HARDY, “Exploitation forestière et environne-ment au Québec, 1850-1920,” Zeitschrift für Kanada-Studien,vol. 27, no. 15, 1995, pp. 63-79.

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study by Hardy and Séguin indicates that thedevelopment of the forest industry was thework of the conquering bourgeoisie. Aneconomic resource, forests were also a leverfor conquering society and space, includingthe rural Mauricie area.26 The exploitation ofnatural resources and the use of human re-sources fundamental to forestry activitiesattracted the interest of an education histo-rian, Jean-Pierre Charland, who worked spe-cifically on technological changes affecting theproduction of pulp and paper.27 Thesechanges had a considerable impact on the ex-traction of raw materials, while being guidedby the calculation of forestry potential.Charland mentions the environmental conse-quences of paper production. However, he

26. Jack Little provides similar data for part of the EasternTownships on a related issue (Jack LITTLE, Colonialism,Nationalism and Capitalism. The Upper St. Francis, Montrealand Kingston, McGill-Queen’s University Press, 1988).

27. Jean-Pierre CHARLAND, Les pâtes et papiers au Québec1880-1980. Technologies, travail et travailleurs, Québec, Insti-tut québécois de recherche sur la culture, 1990.

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confines his study to the immediate plant areaand does not discuss the impact of technolo-gical innovation on forestry potential, deple-tion of the resource or the transformation ofthe vegetation cover over time. Withoutexpressing environmental history concernsper se, Guy Gaudreau recognizes the conse-quences of resource depletion on workers,forced to find and move to new sites aroundwhich hamlets develop.28 It should be notedthat Gaudreau produced very thoroughstudies of the data provided by scalers andpublished by the State.29 Anyone interested inpreparing forest profiles using official datashould show equal methodological acumen.

Mining is important in the history ofQuébec because it opened frontiers in the

28. Guy GAUDREAU, “Exploitation des forêts publiques auQuébec (1874-1905). Transition et nouvel essor,” Revue d’his-toire de l’Amérique française, vol. 42, no. 1, 1988, pp. 3-26.

29. Guy GAUDREAU, “L’État, le mesurage du bois et la pro-motion de l’industrie papetière,” Revue d’histoire de l’Améri-que française, vol. 43, no. 3, 1989, pp. 203-219.

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northwest during the interwar period and onthe North Shore after World War II ; it gaverise to a new socio-political elite during theecclesiastical-political domination immedia-tely following World War II. Labour historianshave shown an interest in miners’ struggles,their working conditions underground andtheir living conditions in the towns created toaccommodate and mould new communi-ties.30 The considerable capital required forthe extraction and primary processing of oreattracted the attention of business historians,who concentrated on a specific ore – particu-larly asbestos – or an entire sector in its rela-tions with government.31 Despite adequate

30. For example, Guy BÉLANGER, “La grève de Mur-dochville (1957),” Labour/Le Travailleur, vol. 8-9, 1981, pp.103-135 ; J. Charles ALLARD, Jean-Paul GOUPIL, O. J. CORMIER

and Roland ALLARD, “Murdochville. Naissance d’une ville,”Gaspésie, vol. 31, no. 2, 1993, pp. 6-21 ; Guy GAUDREAU, L’his-toire des mineurs du Nord ontarien et québécois, Sillery, Sep-tentrion, 2004.

31. Marc VALLIÈRES, Des mines et des hommes. Histoire del’industrie minérale québécoise. Des origines au début des

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coverage of the social, economic and politicaldimensions of mining, history remains silentabout the ways in which the industry hasradically transformed the landscape, creatingcraters and mountains as well as toxic wasterunoff and emanations from smelters.32 Thisimpact on the environment is often accom-panied by harmful effects on the health ofworkers and, to a lesser but real degree, onthat of residents living near extraction andprocessing sites. These consequences, mani-fested over variable time scales, must beexplored. Finally, there is the study on theSaint-Maurice iron works carried out by ParksCanada historians and René Hardy, who

années 1980, Québec, Publications du Québec, 1988 ; PierrePAQUETTE, Les mines du Québec 1867-1975. Une évaluationcritique du mode historique d’industrialisation nationale,Outremont, Carte Blanche, 2000 ; Robert ARMSTRONG, “TheAsbestos Industry in Quebec 1878-1929,” PhD thesis,Université Laval, 1978.

32. Richard V. FRANCAVIGLIA, Hard Places. Reading theLandscape of America’s Historic Mining Districts, Iowa City,University of Iowa Press, 1991.

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examined the variety of habitat types and theconditions of workers and craftspeople.33

Although historians have taken a greaterinterest in the socio-cultural landscape thanthe environment, they have shown a definiteawareness of the material dimension of theland and resources and their imprinting onthe regional imaginary.

Hydroelectric power generation, likemining, is approached from the standpoint ofgovernment policy and its effect on the eco-nomic development of Québec and outlyingareas.34 The ecological dimensions of thismajor symbol of economic and social changein Québec are virtually unknown from a

33. René HARDY, La sidérurgie dans le monde rural. Leshauts fourneaux du Québec au XIXe siècle, Québec, Les Pressesde l’Université Laval, “Géographie historique,” 1995.

34. In addition to the works cited above, see ClarenceHOGUE, André BOLDUC and Daniel LAROUCHE, Québec, un siè-cle d’électricité, Montreal, Libre Expression, 1979 ; YvesBÉLANGER and Robert COMEAU [eds.]s, Hydro-Québec, autrestemps, autres défis, Québec, Presses de l’Université duQuébec, 1995.

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historical perspective. The studies by ClaudeBellavance and David Massell on the Shawi-nigan Water and Power Corporation and theQuebec Development Company focus onbusinesses whose importance is assessed, tosome degree, by the transformation of the ter-ritories they served.35 Although very interes-ted in the appropriation and exploitation ofriver water resources in Québec, these studiesdo not talk about the impact of hydroelectricprojects on the ecosystems and organizationof the territory. While they do discuss theconflicts regarding the allocation of resourcesand multiple use of waterways, they provideno information about the impact of newwaterway flow regimes on neighbouringpopulations or about the transformation ofwatershed catchment basins and their integra-

35. David MASSELL, Amassing Power. J. B. Duke and theSaguenay River 1897-1927, Montreal and Kingston, McGill-Queen’s University Press, 2000 ; Claude BELLAVANCE, Shawi-nigan Water and Power 1898-1963. Formation et déclin d’ungroupe industriel au Québec, Montreal, Boréal, 1994.

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tion with production facilities. The industria-lization of rivers and the consequences thereofthus require study. An article by Bellavancedoes refer to the role of the conservationmovement in establishing the Québec StreamsCommission and a provincial policy targetingthe rational use of water resources. It indicateshow hydrological knowledge and the re-evaluation of power potential has led to a newmode of resource appropriation, and showsthe ways in which the territory can be trans-formed through the construction of reservoirsand the regulation of streams.36

36. Claude BELLAVANCE, “L’État, la “houille blanche” et legrand capital. L’aliénation des ressources hydrauliques du do-maine public québécois au début du XXe siècle,” Revue d’his-toire de l’Amérique française, vol. 51, no. 1, 1998, pp. 1-32. Ona similar subject, see Jacinthe PLAMONDON, “Élaborationd’une perspective environnementale dans le secteur del’hydroélectricité au Québec, 1890-1939,” Master’s thesis,Université du Québec à Trois-Rivières, 2000. See also ClaudeBELLAVANCE, “La puissance de l’eau,” Claude BOUDREAU,Serge COURVILLE and Normand SÉGUIN [eds.], Le territoire, op.cit., pp. 85-93 ; and “Réseaux, territoires et électricité. La

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It is probably the history of agriculturethat, strangely, provides us with the least in-formation on the evolution of the relationshipbetween society and nature, especially giventhe detailed attention that Québec rural his-tory and the development of modern agri-culture have received. This is doubly so whenone considers the relationship betweenhumans and the environment seems to be avery close one in agriculture, given the mani-pulation of soil, plants and animals, to thepoint where nature and culture merge.Historical works, long focused on the politicaland agricultural crisis of the 1830s, dwell onthe intensity and efficiency of grain produc-tion, and the transition to dairy farming, withlittle consideration for any other farmingactivity. Once rural histories show that French

dynamique spatiale du processus d’électrification du Québecméridional,” Serge COURVILLE and Normand SÉGUIN [eds.],Espace et culture/Space and Culture, Sainte-Foy, Les Presses del’Université Laval, “Géographie historique,” 1995, pp. 393-404.

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Canadian farmers were neither better norworse than their English Canadian counter-parts,37 being guided by the same economicrationality, they attempt to illustrate themodernity and efficiency of Québec agri-culture.38 While we now know a considerableamount about the ideology and business-mindedness of the socio-spatial class respon-sible for the growth of dairy farming, weremain unaware of the ecological conditionsand consequences of that “great transforma-tion,” be it on the composition of herds or thesanitary conditions of agro-food productionin rural areas. As ridiculous as it might seem,cows are simply absent from the history of thedairy industry !39 History is similarly silent

37. John MCCALLUM, Unequal Beginnings : Agriculturaland Economic Development in Quebec and Ontario until 1870,Toronto, University of Toronto Press, 1980.

38. See the collective work edited by Normand SÉGUIN

[ed.], Agriculture et colonisation au Québec. Aspects histori-ques, Montreal, Boréal, 1980.

39. To be convinced, see Normand PERRON, “Genèse desactivités laitières,” Normand SÉGUIN [ed.], Agriculture et

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about the agricultural elements that were notin line with government policies acceleratingthe change.40 It should, however, bementioned that ethno-historian Paul-LouisMartin gave fruits a pivotal role in his recenthistorical study of agriculture ; his researchdeals with Euro-Canadians’ adaptation ofAmerican fruit and the invasion of Europeanspecies in America.41

Historians have also dealt with gameresources, focusing on the social relations

colonisation au Québec. Aspects historiques, Montreal, BoréalExpress, 1980, pp. 113-140. In a recent thesis published in the“Géographie historique,” Perron provides information onthese aspects of the change in agriculture in Québec(Normand PERRON, L’État et le changement agricole dansCharlevoix, 1850-1950, Sainte-Foy, Les Presses de l’UniversitéLaval, “Géographie historique,” 2003).

40. Similarly, although farming and logging serve as aparadigm for a major part of rural history, the maintenanceof wood lots on farms is an economic and aesthetic pheno-menon oddly unknown to us.

41. Paul-Louis MARTIN, Les fruits du Québec, Sillery,Septentrion, 2002.

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underlying the exploitation of wildlife andhumans. Their studies in this respect point upthe privileges of the urban Anglo-Saxonaffluent classes who exercised a territorial andcultural monopoly on game resources inoutlying areas, primarily through theirhunting and fishing clubs, sanctioned bygovernment authorities who considered thema guarantee of conservation.42 While thehistoriography clearly portrays the unequalaccess to hunting grounds and fishing rivers,Paul-Louis Martin distinguishes himself againthrough his approach.43 He brings the evo-lution of fauna and flora into the transfor-mation of hunting practices and the changingmeanings that hunters attribute to species overtime. His work parallels that of environmental

42. Donald GUAY, Introduction à l’histoire des sports auQuébec, Montreal, VLB éditeur, 1987. See also Sylvain GIN-GRAS, A Century of Sport. Hunting and Fishing in Québec, St-Raymond, Éditions Rapides blancs, 1994.

43. Paul-Louis MARTIN, La chasse au Québec, Montreal,Boréal, 1990.

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historians in Canada and the United States,whose studies on natural parks discuss theappropriation of ecological elements butdeliberately exclude people, be they Abori-ginals, rural dwellers or immigrants.44 Thesestudies, which also touch on ecotourism(hunting parties certainly being one of theoldest forms), enumerate acts of resistanceand “weapons of the weak” such as arson,poaching, illegal cutting and squatting.45

Confronted with foreign capital intendedto deprive them of their resources, econo-mically disadvantaged social actors are victims

44. Mark SPENCE, Dispossessing the Wilderness. IndianRemoval and the Making of the National Parks, New York,Oxford University Press, 1999 ; Karl JACOBY, Crimes AgainstNature. Squatters, Poachers, and the Hidden History ofAmerican Conservation, Los Angeles, University of CaliforniaPress, 2001 ; Alan MACEACHERN, Natural Selections : NationalParks in Atlantic Canada, 1935-1970, Montreal and Kingston,McGill-Queen’s University Press, 2001.

45. Based on James C. SCOTT, Weapons of the Weak.Everyday Forms of Peasant Resistance, New Haven/London,Yale University Press, 1985.

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of environmental injustice on two levels : theyare dispossessed both of the fruits of theirlabour and the wealth of their land. Althoughfocused on the exploitation or preservation ofthe environment, studies of the socio-economics of natural resources nonethelessreveal inequalities and struggles that have animpact on the transformation of theenvironment and its characteristics.

URBAN STUDIES : PUBLIC HEALTH ANDTHE BUILT ENVIRONMENT OF THE CITY

The urban environment has long been thepoor relative of environmental history, whichis spontaneously associated with the wilder-ness. Technology historians were the first onesto emphasize the relevance of their workconcerning urban infrastructures ; some ofthem picked up on topics stressed by environ-mentalists such as industrial pollution, wastemanagement, and water and atmospheric

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contamination.46 These issues go back to thestruggle of progressives and reformers for ahealthy environment and their fight againstthe ills of a corrupt, industrial world plaguedby rampant capitalism. Urban historians thencame to emphasize the specificity of theirsubject as being the built environment. Whenwe add to that the energy and land issuesposed by the sprawl of cities and the growth ofthe suburbs, we have all the ingredients tomake urban studies one of the most stimu-lating points of convergence in environmentalhistory.

Approached from this perspective, theQuébec urban environment has been thesubject of studies that provide insight into the

46. Joel TARR, Search for the Ultimate Sink. UrbanPollution in Historical Perspective, Akron, University of AkronPress, 1996 ; Martin MELOSI, The Sanitary City. UrbanInfrastructure in America from Colonial Times to the Present,Baltimore, Johns Hopkins University Press, 2000 and “ThePlace of the City in Environmental History,” EnvironmentalHistory Review, vol. 17, no. 1, 1993, pp. 1-23.

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relationship between city dwellers and theirenvironment.47 Research on infrastructureshas gotten off to a particularly good start andoffers information on the shaping of theurban environment and on public health – inthe case of infrastructures such as water andsewer systems – as a telling sign of theenvironment of city dwellers and their socio-economic conditions.

Building Canada : A History of PublicWorks, edited by Norman Ball, provides acomprehensive picture of infrastructureworks from the standpoint of the history oftechnology.48 It examines public works andthe materials used, and takes into accountland appropriation in the urban environmentfor the purpose of increasing economic effi-ciency. These facilities, it should be mentioned,

47. Claire Poitras, “L’histoire urbaine environnementaleau Québec. Un domaine de recherche en emergence,” Globe,vol. 9, no. 1 (2006), p. 93-111.

48. Norman BALL [ed.], Building Canada : A History ofPublic Works, Montreal, Boréal, 1988.

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partially determine the future organization ofcities and their economic activity. Specificstudies on electricity, public transportationand telephone service have been publishedrecently ; they include aesthetic considera-tions on the transformation of the urban en-vironment with respect to the architecture ofthe buildings that house the infrastructures.49

The studies carried out on the “conquestof water” provide particularly relevant infor-mation for the analysis of the changing rela-

49. Claire POITRAS, La cité au bout du fil, Montreal, Pressesde l’Université de Montréal, 2000 ; Denis VEILLEUX, “Buses,Tramways, and Monopolies. The Introduction of MotorVehicles into Montreal’s Public Transportation Network,”Michigan Historical Review, vol. 22, 1996, pp. 103-126 ;Claude BELLAVANCE and Paul-André LINTEAU, “La diffusionde l’électricité à Montréal au début du XXe siècle,” HoracioCAPEL and Paul-André LINTEAU [eds.], Barcelona-Montréal.Desarollo urbano comparado/Développement urbain comparé,Barcelone, Publications de la Universitat de Barcelona, 1998,pp. 238-258 ; Christopher ARMSTRONG et H.V. NELLES, Mono-poly’s Moment. The Organization and Regulation of CanadianUtilities, 1830-1930, Toronto, University of Toronto Press,1986.

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tions between society and the environment.They show how the control of water wasnecessary to the free circulation of individualsand goods, and somewhat determined theroutes of exchange in the developing city,ultimately structuring the relationshipbetween city dwellers and their built environ-ment (including roads, water systems andbuildings).50 These studies also provideinsight into the coexistence between humansand microbes, as well as the constant efforts ofthe former to eliminate the latter or keep themat a distance. The link between environmentalhistory and the history of health evolvedaround epidemics, approached from an angleother than the microbial invasion of Americaby European carriers.51 In the case of cities un-dergoing urbanization and industrialization,

50. Dany FOUGÈRES, Du privé au public. L’approvisionne-ment en eau à Montréal, Sillery, Septentrion, 2004.

51. Alfred CROSBY, Ecological Imperialism. The BiologicalExpansion of Europe 900-1900, Cambridge, CambridgeUniversity Press, 1986.

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with poor or non-existent infrastructures, thecontrol of water distribution, consumptionand disposal was crucial to public health. Theimplementation of the water and sewersystems (and food cleaning and inspectionservices) became a turning point in theinteraction between society and the cityenvironment. The management of healthconditions by the medical elite and politicalauthorities thus provides us with informationon the transformation of the urbanenvironment spurred by microbial prolifera-tion ; it also reveals which conditions forurban environmental change result from theefforts of elites and governments to controlthe spread of epidemics and to prevent theiroutbreak.52

52. Denis GOULET, “Des bureaux d’hygiène municipauxaux unités sanitaires. Le Conseil d’hygiène de la province deQuébec et la structuration d’un système de santé publique,1886-1926,” Revue d’histoire de l’Amérique française, vol. 49,no. 4, Spring 1996, pp. 496-520 ; François GUÉRARD, “Lasanté publique dans deux villes du Québec de 1887 à 1939 :

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While urban history, the history of healthand environmental history converge in thisstudy of infrastructures to reveal the techno-logical and ecological dimensions of epide-mics, other works enable us to understand thecauses of “inequalities in the face of death,”where exposure to urban living conditionsconducive to illness and death depend on classand race. This is the case of working and im-migrant families whose sanitary conditionsare studied in historical demographics by peo-ple like Sherry Olson and Patricia Thornton,as well as François Guérard.53 Rooted in

Trois-Rivières et Shawinigan,” doctoral thesis, Université duQuébec à Montréal, 1993 ; Claudine DESCHÊNES, “Santépublique et organisation de la profession médicale au Québec1870-1918,” Revue d’histoire de l’Amérique française vol. 35no. 3, December 1981, pp. 355-375 ; Martin TÉTREAULT, “Lesmaladies de la misère. Aspects de la santé publique àMontréal 1880-1994,” Revue d’histoire de l’Amérique fran-çaise, vol. 36, no. 4, 1983, pp. 507-526.

53. François GUÉRARD, “L’hygiène publique et le recul dela mortalité infantile. Trois-Rivières de 1895 à 1939,” Cahiersquébécois de démographie, vol. 30, no. 2, 2001, pp. 231-259 ;

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adverse socio-economic conditions, theseenvironmental inequalities have several causeswhich need to be differentiated ; apart fromthe negligence of public authorities to provideadequate infrastructures, the role of industrialfacilities must be examined in the environ-mental contamination of working class neigh-bours.54 A study of inequalities also offers aperspective for broaching the questions ofurban sprawl and of suburbs located in areasat risk.55

The experience of nature in the city mustalso be considered in this survey of urban

Patricia THORNTON and Sherry OLSON, “A Deadly Discrimi-nation among Montreal Infants, 1860-1900,” Continuity andChange, vol. 16, no. 1, 2001, pp. 95-135.

54. Andrew HURLEY, Environmental Inequalities. Class,Race and Industrial Pollution in Gary, Indiana, 1945-1980,Chapel Hill, University of North Carolina Press, 1999 ;Martin MELOSI, “Equity, Eco-racism and Environmental His-tory,” Environmental History Review, vol., 19 no. 3, Fall 1995,pp. 1-16.

55. On the dangers in marginal areas, see Ted STEINBERG,Acts of God. The Unnatural History of Natural Disaster inAmerica, New York, Oxford University Press, 2000.

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studies. Parks and the recreational activities ofresidents appear at the crossroads of munici-pal infrastructures and public health. Parksare usually green spaces whose symbolic valueis intended to compensate for nature removedfrom the urban environment, whilerecreational activities are often conceived bymedical health officers to improve the healthof people subjected to an environment pol-luted by industry and dominated by concrete.Research on bathhouses and suburban resortsreveal links between nature and the body.56

The study of the suburbs, havens of peace mar-red by pesticide-soaked lawns, the destruction

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56. Michèle DAGENAIS, “Fuir la ville. Villégiature etvillégiateurs dans la région de Montréal, 1890-1940,” Revued’histoire de l’Amérique française, vol. 58, no. 3, 2005,pp. 315-346. See also Diane SAINT-LAURENT, “Approches bio-géographiques de la nature en ville. Parcs, espaces verts etfriches,” Cahiers de géographie du Québec, vol. 45, no. 122,2000, pp. 147-166 ; Gilles SÉNÉCAL and Diane SAINT-LAURENT,“Espaces libres et enjeux écologiques. Deux récits du dévelop-pement urbain à Montréal,” Recherches sociographiques,vol. 40, no. 1, 1999, pp. 33-54.

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of agricultural lands and wetlands, andstressful, polluting highways, point out theparadoxes of nature far removed from thewilderness and of an environment as artificialas that of the city.57

ENVIRONMENTAL SCIENCES :AN ECOLOGICAL HISTORY OF QUÉBEC

Well before the advent of evolutionarybiology, the natural sciences took a diachroniclook at their subject, identifying changes instructures and suggesting mechanisms toexplain them. In its early days, scientificecology adopted a similar viewpoint toexplain successions in vegetation commu-nities. Ecological change over time was thus a

57. Jean-Pierre COLLIN and Claire POITRAS, “La fabrica-tion d’un espace suburbain. La Rive-Sud de Montréal,”Recherches sociographiques, vol. 43, no. 2, 2002, pp. 275-310.On suburban sprawl in the United States, see Adams ROME,The Bulldozer in the Countryside. Suburban Sprawl and theRise of American Environmentalism, Cambridge, CambridgeUniversity Press, 2001.

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component of scientific studies, which pro-vided a non-narrative history of the environ-ment and its human and non-human actors.Specialties such as palynology and dendro-chronology and subjects like paleo-floods andpaleo-fires have grown in number in the pastfew decades and form part of a new type ofhistoricization of nature. Natural scientistscontribute to research in environmental his-tory, as mentioned earlier in this article withreference to Europeans. Many of them areinterested specifically in the man-inducedcauses of changes in the ecosystem, even whensuch causes are supposedly natural, such asclimatic events. They go so far as to consultarchives, a method generally associated withthe work of historians. It thus seems appro-priate to complete this survey by calling parti-cular attention to the contribution of forestecologists, earth scientists and limnologists.

Reconstructions of two major forest eco-system disruptions – fires and insect infesta-tions – are of particular interest because such

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natural phenomena are often directly orindirectly caused by human action. Whileecologists strive to determine where responsi-bilities lie, the multifactoral and diachronicanalyses they conduct of these events are ofprimary importance. The history of fires inAbitibi, in northwestern Québec, is the subjectof several studies in which researchers attemptto describe the natural fire regime so that theycan develop forest management scenariosbased on the natural disturbance regime.58

58. Daniel J. GRENIER et al., “Fire Frequency for the Tran-sitional Mixedwood Forest of Timiskaming, Quebec,Canada,” Canadian Journal of Forestry Research, vol. 35, 2005,pp. 656-666 ; Daniel LESIEUR et al., “Fire Frequency and Vege-tation Dynamics for the South-central Boreal Forest of Que-bec, Canada,” Canadian Journal of Forestry Research, vol. 32,2002, pp. 1996-2009 ; Daniel LESIEUR, “Reconstitution histo-rique des feux et de la dynamique forestière dans le secteur duréservoir Gouin, Québec,” Master’s thesis, Université duQuébec à Montréal, 2000 ; Hubert MORIN, “Dynamics ofBalsam Fir Forests in Relation to Spruce Budworm Outbreaksin the Boreal Zone, Québec,” Canadian Journal of ForestryResearch, vol. 24, no. 4, April 1994, pp. 730-741 ; Y. BERGE-RON and S. ARCHAMBAULT, “Decreasing Frequency of Forest

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They reconstruct the history of human occu-pation to establish the effects of colonizationand climate change throughout the cycles andto assess the impact of man-induced disrup-tions (including forest fire control) on the fireregime and regional forest vegetation. Whilethese studies do not provide us with informa-tion on the perception of the phenomenastudied,59 they do indicate their frequency andextent ; they also discuss the role of weatherconditions in the outbreak of fires and pavethe way for an analysis of the relations bet-ween the material and intellectual dimensionsof nature.

Insect infestations constitute another ma-jor disturbance of forests which entomologists

Fires in the Southern Boreal Zone of Québec and its Relationto Global Warming since the End of the “Little Ice Age”,” TheHolocene, vol. 3, 1993, pp. 255-259.

59. As Stephen J. PYNE does in his works (see Fire inAmerica. A Cultural History of Wildland and Rural Fire,Princeton, Princeton University Press, 1982 ; World Fire. TheCulture of Fire on Earth, Seattle, University of WashingtonPress, 1995).

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reconstruct over time. Establishing infestationzones and studying the spread of harmfulinsect populations have been facilitated sincethe introduction of the Canadian ForestInsect and Disease Survey in 1939. Ento-mologists use this tool to predict infestationsand carry out analyses in population ecology,particularly with respect to the extent ofinfestations, predispositions of forests andclimatic factors triggering infestation. Insectsthat have the most serious economic impactare the subjects of such reconstructions. Thespruce budworm is a case in point ; its move-ment has been mapped in Québec in minutedetail.60 Entomologists began studying the

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60. J. R. BLAIS, “Trends in the Frequency, Extent andSeverity of Spruce Budworm Outbreaks in Eastern Canada,”Canadian Journal of Forestry Research, vol. 13, no. 4, August1983, pp. 539-547 ; Hubert MORIN, Danielle MORIN and YvesBERGERON, “Chronology of Spruce Budworm Outbreaks inthe Lake Duparquet Region, Abitibi, Quebec,” CanadianJournal of Forestry Research, vol. 23, no. 8, August 1993,pp. 1497-1506 ; Yan BOULANGER and Dominique ARSENAULT,“Spruce Budworm Outbreaks in Eastern Quebec over the

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infestation cycle to detect the role of humanfactors likely to cause such outbreaks, becauseof their impact on forest conditions. Resear-chers have established, through dendrochro-nology, the infestation cycles of the sprucebudworm since the late 18th century, strivingto see how the change in the composition ofthe vegetation cover caused by successiveforest industries has accelerated and inten-sified the destructive cycles of the insect.

Québec waterways have also been thesubject of historical reconstructions. The St.Lawrence River in particular gave rise to amajor interdisciplinary research initiative.61

Environment Canada researchers – a historianand geologist specializing respectively in land-use planning and fluvial modelling – recons-tructed the bed of the St. Lawrence River usingmaps prepared by 19th century hydrographers

Last 450 Years,” Canadian Journal of Forest Research, vol. 34,2004, pp. 1035-1043.

61. Richard CARIGNAN, “Le Lac Saint-Pierre en péril,”Québec Science, May 2004, pp. 20-27.

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and contracts detailing dredging sites andvolumes removed.62 The shallowness of LacSaint-Pierre, upstream of Trois-Rivières,prevented vessels from reaching Montréal,unless craft capable of navigating shallowwaters were used. The British undertookdredging work in the first half of the 19thcentury. Successive waves of dredging work, in1844, 1865, 1882, 1888 and 1907, continuallywidened the channel to meet technologicalchanges in St. Lawrence River shipping andthe demands of merchants and ship owners.This reconstruction provides a picture of thechanges in the hydrodynamics and ecologicalfunctions not only of the river, but also of itstributaries, their shores and their deltas. Thechannel would explain, for example, theorigin of a species of fish on the south shore

62. Jean MORIN and Jean-Philippe CÔTÉ, “Modificationsanthropiques sur 150 ans au Lac Saint-Pierre. Une fenêtre surles transformations de l’écosystème du Saint-Laurent,”Vertig-O. La revue des sciences de l’environnement, vol. 4,no. 3, 2003, pp. 1-10.

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related to a similar species on the north shore,but unable to reproduce with it. The fluvialmodelling prepared on the basis of thisresearch will be used to oversee the restorationof the main ecological functions of theSt. Lawrence.

In these chronological reconstructions ofenvironments and natural phenomena, envi-ronmental disturbances are often a sign ofhuman activity. Present discussions on cli-mate change will certainly encourage scien-tists to use historical methods in striving tounderstand the role of natural and man-induced factors in shaping the environment.63

63. A geographer is already working on a study of floodsin the Saint-François river basin. Diane SAINT-LAURENT et al.,“Chronological Reconstitution of Floods of the Saint-François Drainage Basin, Québec, Canada,” 3rd CanadianConference on Geotechniques and Natural Hazard, 2003,pp. 89-93.

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TWO PROPOSALS AND ONE COMMENT FOR THINKINGABOUT THE ENVIRONMENTAL HISTORY OF QUÉBEC

In light of this survey, can it be affirmedthat an environmental history of Québec ac-tually exists ? When we consider the adversityof the host environment and the biotic sub-mission of indigenous populations, bothhuman and non-human ; the participation ofthe French colony in the triangle of primaryresource exchange and the continental socio-economic integration of Québec ; the epide-mics that have struck indigenous communi-ties and the unhealthiness of cities undergoingindustrialization and urbanization, we can af-firm that the geographic condition of Québecand the involvement of its society in the greattransformations of the modern world haveeffectively contributed to positioning thenation and its territory in world environmen-tal history.

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While Québec studies have regularly dealtwith the history of Québec’s environment, ouranswer to the question is qualified. The workssurveyed here from various disciplines did notsystematically set out to study the relationshipbetween society and the environment, so itwould be dishonest to view them in a lightother than that of the specific problematicsexplored. What we have wanted to call atten-tion to is the historiography of Québec envi-ronmental history. The knowledge availablefor a history of the interaction betweensociety and the environment is rich – rich inmaterial, sources, methods and questions tobe examined in greater depth. This richnesscertainly stems from the involvement ofresearchers from different disciplines andfields of study who have all worked on Qué-bec, its territory and its peoples. While takinginto account the approaches and findings oftheir research, we must acknowledge the inter-disciplinary nature of it. These studies, whichbenefit from a combination of disciplinary

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approaches – in history, geography, urbanstudies and demographics, for example – offera meeting ground for the integration ofknowledge on ecological processes and theshaping of new subjects for an environmenthistory of Québec. More importantly,environmental history can contribute to thisrichness, and I would like to wind up bydiscussing a few of areas of world environ-mental history and suggesting avenues forresearch for understanding the evolution ofthe interaction between society and the envi-ronment in Québec.

The first area involves the relationshipbetween the body and the environment.64

64. Gregg MITMANN, Michelle MURPHY and ChristopherSELLERS [eds.], “Landscapes of Exposure. Knowledge and Ill-ness in Modern Environments,” Osiris, no. 19, Chicago, Uni-versity of Chicago Press, 2004 ; Christine MEISNER ROSEN andChristopher C. SELLERS, “The Nature of the Firm. Towards anEcocultural History of Business,” Business History Review,vol. 73, no. 4, 1999, pp. 577-600. It would also be interestingto see concurrent representations of health and the environ-ment by individuals, as in Conevery Bolton VALENCIUS, The

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Consider the premise of the book by RachelCarson, Silent Spring,65 and its impact on therise of contemporary environmentalism : bycomparing the health of the planet with thatof the human being, and discussing theimpact of toxic substances on the metabolicpatterns of ecological disturbances resultingfrom the presence of such substances in theenvironment, Silent Spring was a majorcatalyst in raising environmental awareness inthe United States.66 Environmental historianscan not only expose unthought-of sources ofpower through their study of nature, but theycan also reveal relationships of domination –

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Health of the Country. How American Settlers UnderstoodThemselves and their Land, New York, Basic Books, 2002.

65. Rachel CARSON, Silent Spring, Boston, HoughtonMifflin, 1962.

66. Paolo PALLADINO, “On “environmentalism”. TheOrigins of the Debates over Policy for Pest-Control Researchin America, 1960-1975,” Michael SHORTLAND [ed.], Scienceand Nature. Essays in the History of the EnvironmentalSciences, Stratford-in-the-Vale, British Society for the Historyof Science, 1994, pp. 181-212.

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just as crucial as those stemming from theownership of means of production – byinvestigating the actions and reaction of thehuman body to environmental changes. Wehave mentioned instances of environmentalinequalities to which certain fringes of thepopulation are subjected. While some peopleare denied access to resources or territories, itis the ones deprived of healthy living condi-tions that are of interest to us, be they in thework environment, at home or in the vicinityof extraction, production or consumptionsites. It is hoped that this research topic will bepursued beyond the realm of urban studies.The study of the relationship between thebody and the environment would provide anapproach for the history of enterprises and ofworkers exposed to polluting processes at orin the vicinity of plants generating pollutionand environmental inequalities.

This area of research leads us to considerthe most intimate relationships betweenhumans and their environment, and follow

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Alain Corbin’s lead in his history of thesenses.67 Smell, hearing, taste and touchwould be studied in addition to sight – ordi-narily emphasized by historians – in recons-tructing the phenomenological experience ofactors in their environment.68 The body has ahistory, and the study of that history would

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67. Alain CORBIN, Le miasme et la jonquille. L’odorat etl’imaginaire social, XVIIIe-XIXe siècles, Paris, Aubier, 1982 ; Lescloches de la terre. Paysage sonore et culture sensible dans lescampagnes au XIXe siècle, Paris, Albin Michel, 1994 ; “Pourune histoire de la sensibilité au temps qu’il fait,” Le ciel et lamer, Paris, Bayard, 2005, pp. 1-46 ; and Alain CORBIN et al.[[eds.]], Histoire du corps, Paris, Seuil, 2005-2006, 3 volumes.

68. Georges VIGARELLO, Le propre et le sale. L’hygiène ducorps depuis le Moyen Âge, Paris, Seuil, 1985 ; Robert DULAU

and Jean-Robert PITTE, Géographie des odeurs, Paris/Montreal, L’Harmattan, 1998 ; Christopher SELLERS, “Tho-reau’s Body. Towards an Embodied Environmental History,”Environmental History vol. 4, October 1999, pp. 486-515 ;Mark M. SMITH, “Making sense of social history,” Journal ofSocial History vol. 37, Fall 2003, pp. 165-179 ; Joy PARR,“Smells like. Sources of Uncertainty in the History of theGreat Lakes Environment,” Environmental History, vol. 11,April 2006, pp. 269-299.

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reveal relations with the environment – parti-cularly pleasure and stress – other than thosequantified by the natural and biomedicalsciences. Take, for example, the olfactoryexperience of the lawyer from the EasternTownships who was so disturbed by the putridsmells emanating from a Windsor Mills paperplant that he issued an injunction, shuttingdown the plant in the middle of an economiccrisis.69 The sense experience of the body, sosignificantly captured by anthropologists,remains an area neglected by historians.70 Yetits study would give rise to insight on themeanings societies attribute to the quality oftheir environment, their perception of riskand their uncertainties about environmentalchanges which often accompany social chan-

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69. Canada Paper Company c. Brown, (1922) 63 R.C.S.243.

70. As Joy PARR, among others, emphasizes in “Notes fora More Sensuous History of Twentieth Century Canada. TheTimely, the Tacit and the Material Body,” CanadianHistorical Review, vol. 82, 2001, pp. 720-745.

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ges.71 It would also provide avenues for exa-mining the increasingly pervasive nature ofpollution – from the perception and represen-tation of stressors, and the rise in environ-mental concerns and intolerance among localcommunities, to attempts by health, economicand political authorities to manage suchperceptions.72

Consumption is a second area to beexamined, as it would unite the topics treatedin the studies surveyed here, such as the linksbetween extraction and processing ofresources, industrialization and urbanization,production and pollution, as well as ruralareas and urban centres.73 More specifically, it

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71. Estelle BARET-BOURGOIN, La ville industrielle et sespoisons. Les mutations des sensibilités aux nuisances et pollu-tions industrielles à Grenoble 1810-1914, Grenoble, Pressesuniversitaires de Grenoble, 2005.

72. This is in reference tothe societal odour-control initia-tive of the elites studied by CORBIN in Le miasme et la jonquille.

73. Matthew W. KINGLE, “Spaces of Consumption inEnvironmental History,” History and Theory, vol. 42, no. 1,2003, pp. 94-110.

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would include the networks of exchange thatare formed and their ecological footprints. Aseries of works in urban environmental histo-ry have borrowed the concept of metabolismfrom scientific ecology (which borrowed itfrom physiology) to study the city and deli-neate its material and energy flow inunderstanding the ecological relationsbetween city dwellers and their land.74 Theserelations are created through the importing offoodstuffs in particular, but also the goods

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74. The concept was probably first mentioned by A.WOLMAN in “The Metabolism of Cities,” Scientific American,vol. 213, no. 3, 1965, pp. 179-190. One of the first allusions toit in urban environmental history can be found in the articleby Joel TARR, “The Metabolism of the Industrial City. TheCase of Pittsburgh,” Journal of Urban History, vol. 28, 2002,pp. 511-545. Sabine BARLES provides a thoughtful applicationof the concept in L’invention des déchets urbains. France 1790-1970, Seyssel, Champs Vallon, 2005. See also VerenaWINIWARTER, “Where Did All the Waters Go ? The Introduc-tion of Sewage Systems in Urban Settlements,” ChristophBERNHARDT [[ed.]], Environmental Problems in EuropeanCities in the 19th and 20th Century, Münster/New York,Waxmann, 2000, pp. 106-120.

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that supply factories in the city, and thedomestic and industrial waste – “excreta” asSabine Barles calls it in her study of urbanwaste in France – used to fertilize farmers’fields ; they are also created through thecirculation of a population that migrates andtransmigrates. These exchanges transform thelandscape, visibly facilitating the transporta-tion of goods and subtlety accelerating thecirculation of elements, such as carbon andnitrogen, and components such as water, thusaltering the soil, water system and atmospherethat the city and country share. Finally, thismetabolism, understood here in terms ofexchange, undergoes radical mutations withthe intensification of industrialization, thetransformation of industrial processes and theintroduction of synthetic components thatcontaminate the “excreta,” preventing it frombeing integrated into the exchange cycles.75

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75. Sabine BARLES, “A Metabolic Approach to the City.Nineteenth and Twentieth Century Paris,” Dieter SCHOTT,

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The study of consumption from the angleof urban metabolism provides us with tools toexamine not only the phenomenon of pollu-tion – its manifestations and transformationsin the context of industrial revolutions – butalso the ecological dimensions of urbaniza-tion and industrialization processes : thestudy of class struggles during industrial revo-lutions should not overlook the fact that thesocial conflicts surrounding the control andexploitation of nature were also crucial to theemergence of industrial capitalism.

There is another area in which the envi-ronmental history of consumption wouldshed valuable light – that of Quebec’s conti-nental socio-economic integration. While weunderstand the effects of American invest-ment – and the integration of agroforestproduction into the main North American

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Bill LUCKIN and Geneviève MASSARD-GUILBAUD [eds.], Resour-ces of the City. Contributions to an Environmental History ofModern Europe, Aldershot, Ashgate, 2005, pp. 28-47.

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markets – on the economic development ofQuébec, our knowledge of the environmentalimpact of continental integration is decidedlyincomplete. This area includes issues that areall the more important to elucidate becausethe introduction of agriculture, forest andother products in international markets hascreated a distance between production andconsumption, thus making the ecologicalcosts of economic activity invisible.76 On theone hand, investment in the mining, forestand energy industries has accelerated thepenetration of territories and the extraction ofnatural resources, with little consideration forthe ability of resources to regenerate. On theother hand, access to local and foreign

76. William CRONON, Nature’s Metropolis ; Ted STEINBERG,Down to Earth. Nature’s Role in American History, Oxford,Oxford University Press, 2002 ; Richard TUCKER, InsatiableAppetite. The United States and the Ecological Degradation ofthe Tropical World, Berkeley, University of California Press,2000.

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markets has encouraged the specialization ofagriculture and silviculture, which has beenaccompanied by insect infestations, diseaseand soil depletion. In both cases, consumershave become increasingly distant fromresource extraction and processing sites andfrom the ecological consequences of thosepractices on the environment. How, duringthe 20th century is this distance overcome tobring production and consumption closertogether and make the ecological effects ofeconomic activities visible? What mechanismsare involved in getting local ecological pro-blems – from debates on the protection ofmigratory birds and the invasion of harmfulforeign insects in the 19th century tocontroversy concerning cross-border atmos-pheric pollution in the late 20th century – onthe international agenda ? Have the frequencyand extent of environmental changes in-creased at the same time as continental inte-gration ? Answering these questions will shedlight on the ecological consequences of North

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American economic integration and identifythe processes underlying the globalization ofenvironmental problems.

My final comments stem from the tworesearch areas mentioned above. From bodilysensibility to social body, from networks ofexchange between city and country to thecontinental socio-economic integration ofQuébec, questions of scale constitute a me-thodological issue on which our thinkingabout the environmental history of Québeccan be based. Of course, Québec studies seemto have an object that is clearly defined anddelimited by borders ; localized case studiesenable researchers to avoid venturing beyondQuébec’s borders, unless they embark oncomparative studies. Two trends in environ-mental history – reminiscent of the essentialtension between the particular and theuniversal in science – nonetheless require usto rethink the natural character of this object.

The first trend stems from criticism of thenation scale and the limitations the nation-

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state imposes on historians.77 Those who arepart of this trend allude to the cross-bordernature of ecological phenomena such aspollution in laying claim to a transnationalhistory, without realizing that they are thusespousing an ideology – that of globaliza-tion – which is as valid as that of the nation-state, the shortcomings of which they readilydenounce. In so doing, they risk forgetting theinstitutional, cultural and socio-economicfoundations of the biogeophysical environ-ment. Think of the role of government agen-cies – unquestionably national in nature – indefining and regulating means of exploitationof natural resources and the resultant shapingof the landscape. It is not appropriate to select

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77. Richard WHITE, “The Nationalization of Nature,”Journal of American History, vol. 86, no. 3, 1999, pp. 976-986 ;I. G. SIMMONS, “The World Scale,” Environment and History,vol. 10, no. 1, 2004, pp. 531-536 ; Shepard KRECH III, J. R.MCNEILL and Carolyn MERCHANT, “Introduction,” The Ency-clopedia of World Environmental History, vol. 1, New York,Routledge, 2003, p. IX.

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national borders automatically since, as wehave shown elsewhere, nature is also involvedin the founding discourses of the nation andthe identity of its population and itsterritory.78 We should also be leery of thosewho strive to show the inescapable charactertherein of relying specifically on environmen-tal attributes that would reflect the naturalcharacter of the nation. That being said, it isnot appropriate to make the global scale amethodological a priori and eliminate all criti-cal reflection on the spatial dimension of theinteraction between society and the environ-ment. The planet is no more a natural scale forthe work of historians than the nation.

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78. Stéphane CASTONGUAY, “Naturalizing Federalism.Insect Outbreaks and the Centralization of EntomologicalResearch in Canada, 1885-1914,” Canadian Historical Review,vol. 75, no. 1, 2004, pp. 1-34 and “Sortir l’histoire dessciences et des techniques de leur contexte national : limites etdéfis du comparatisme,” Scientia Canadiensis, vol. 28, 2005,pp. 39-50.

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The second trend involves basing studiesin environmental history on the bioregion.79

While such an approach seems appealing – itis a scale largely used in the study of ecologicalphenomena – we must question the relevanceof adopting this concept and its applicationwithout recognizing that the bioregion is nota given and that its delimitation is bothcultural and natural. It, too, must be subject tocritical analysis in order to determine how itstems in some cases from its biogeophysicalelements, in others from its socio-economicelements and in yet others, from its socio-cultural representations. The selection of scalerequires conscious delimitation of the spaceunder study : Canada with its plant inspectionpolicies and inclusion in international tradenetworks for agricultural commodities isprobably a more natural environment thanpart of eastern North America, chosen as a

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79. Neil S. FORKEY, op. cit. ; Dan FLORES, “Place. AnArgument for Bioregional History,” Environmental HistoryReview, vol. 18, no. 4, 1994, pp. 1-19.

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scale supposedly on the basis of its bioregionalcharacter. The human activity that has etchedthe biogeophysical characteristics into a terri-tory forming a bioregion must be determinedand indicated. Otherwise, the “bio” in “biore-gion” will only bear the stamp of scientistswho have studied the soil, fauna, flora and anyother abiotic element.

These two scales involve questioning thearea of analysis preferred by area studies. Aspart of this field in the social sciences, Québecstudies cannot be indifferent to these debateswhich fuel environmental history. In the sameway that the global scale must be subject tocritical evaluation – at least the ideologicalbasis for its deployment in the scientific field –the bioregional scale does not constitute agiven. Granting ontological status to the bio-region, nation or world would be to overlookhow these scales result from the action ofhuman beings in the face of environmentalconstraints and potential, and how theinteraction between the environment and

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society shape them. Overall, the relevant scalewill be part of the problematic that shapes theobject of research.

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