Stewardship and the Future of the Planet: Promise and Paradox

This volume examines historical views of stewardship that have sometimes allowed humans to ravage the earth as well as contemporary and futuristic visions of stewardship that will be necessary to achieve pragmatic progress to save life on earth as we know it.

The idea of stewardship - human responsibility to tend the Earth - has been central to human cultures throughout history, as evident in the Judeo-Christian Genesis story of the Garden of Eden and in a diverse range of parallel tales from other traditions around the world. Despite such foundational hortatory stories about preserving the earth on which we live, humanity in the Anthropocene is nevertheless currently destroying the planet with breathtaking speed.

Much research on stewardship today - in the disciplines of geography, urban studies, oceans research, and green business practice - offers insights that should help address the ecological challenges facing the planet. Simultaneous scholarship in the humanities and other fields reminds us that the damage done to the planet has often been carried out in the name of tending the land. In order to make progress in environmental stewardship, scholars must speak to each other across the disciplinary boundaries, as they do in this volume.

Rachel Carnell is Professor of English at Cleveland State University. Having published extensively on eighteenth-century literature and politics, she began working on environmental stewardship after unearthing archival references to eighteenth-century lawsuits that described landed estates in terms of expected monetary output.

Chris Mounsey is Professor of eighteenth-century cultural studies at the University of Winchester. He has published widely on a range of issues including sexuality, disability, and bioethics. He is series editor of the Routledge Advances in the History of Bioethics.