Learning from the Past
Learning from the Past: Historical lessons for sustainability and resilience in a changing environment
Dr. Lee Mordechai and Dr. Amit Tubi
Can we derive useful insights for the 21st century by studying the responses of past societies to environmental stress?
In light of the threats posed by current and projected environmental changes, interest in the impacts of similar changes on past societies has increased dramatically. By studying past examples, we can analyze ‘complete experiments’ of human-environment interactions, with the hope of uncovering lessons for the present and future.
Current research on historical social interactions with environmental stress has often failed to engage with fundamental questions related to learning from history. As a result many of these discussions risk drawing erroneous or inapplicable insights while overlooking important lessons.
“Learning from the Past” contributes a novel perspective to these discussions by investigating the often-underemphasized assumptions and sources of knowledge they draw upon. The project therefore provides the basis for drawing more accurate past-present analogies and resulting policy recommendations.
Read more about the project here.