Toxic Archipelago: A History of Industrial Disease in Japan (Weyerhaeuser Environmental Books)

This fascinating environmental history of Japan examines how traditions and practices in several industries -- from raising silkworms to mining lead and coal to refining petroleum -- have affected the health of workers and those who have lived in these toxic landscapes.

"Historian Walker effectively links, perhaps for the first time anywhere, the historical processes of the economic, social, and land-use policies involved in modernizing and globalizing Japan with the pain and suffering of its environment and people. Never has a book so clearly illustrated the aphorisms 'all politics are local,' 'the personal is the political,' and 'we are what we eat.' This discussion of the evolution of environmentalism in Japan will reflect new light on the understanding of environmental history. Essential." -Choice

Brett Walker is Regents' Professor and department chairperson of history and philosophy at the University of Montana, Bozeman. He is the author of The Lost Wolves of Japan.

Winner of the George Perkins Marsh Prize for Best Book in Environmental History