Conrad Totman seeks to examine the causal linkage between patterns of human interaction with the environment and find answers about the current global environmental crisis (5).  Totman argues that by interrogating the past it is possible to find such answers, where precedent of human interaction starting with the forger period illuminates just how critical and exponential the environmental impact of humans have been in the last 100 years or so. He decides to utilize Japan as a case study for this global analysis due to its relative isolation, wide ranging climate, and distinct periods of human development. 

Primarily, Totman’s work constitutes a recast general survey of Japanese history from its formation to current times.  In doing so, Totman tells two tales in his book that mirror his two research questions.  We can perceive the history of Japan section to be a reflection of Marxian materialism and Annales minded longue durée, where the environment and other material concerns shape the development of concepts like state, nation, and class. He traces the development of what he labels elite-producer relationships through the changing modes of production which overall offers a well supported case study to test the general theory of Marx (see: 74, 93, 97, 99,,144-145, 154-5).   

The larger portion of Totman’s work explores a wide variety of human interactions and the methods with which humans and environment have dialectically altered the physical state of the global sphere.  The longue durée again serves Totman well here to contrast human development and consumption that exponentially climbed in the last 2000 years or so to the millenia before it. Totman argues the availability of ‘energy’ created by either living organisms or later fossil fuels, drove these developments of rapid expansion.  Ultimately Totman calls for a solution to the recent global devastation caused by industrialization and points to the need for a supranational body to legislate above the shortsighted competition of the nation-state.

The larger portion of Totman’s work explores a wide variety of human interactions and the methods with which humans and environment have dialectically altered the physical state of the global sphere.  The longue durée again serves Totman well here to contrast human development and consumption that exponentially climbed in the last 2000 years or so to the millenia before it. Totman argues the availability of ‘energy’ created by either living organisms or later fossil fuels, drove these developments of rapid expansion.  Ultimately Totman calls for a solution to the recent global devastation caused by industrialization and points to the need for a supranational body to legislate above the shortsighted competition of the nation-state (287, 291)