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Famine: A Short History
Famine remains one of the worst calamities that can befall a society. Mass starvation--whether it is inflicted by drought or engineered by misguided or genocidal economic policies--devastates families, weakens the social fabric, and undermines political stability. Cormac Ó Gráda, the acclaimed author who chronicled the tragic Irish famine in books like Black '47 and Beyond , here traces the complete history of famine from the earliest records to today.
Combining powerful storytelling with the latest evidence from economics and history, Ó Gráda explores the causes and profound consequences of famine over the past five millennia, from ancient Egypt to the killing fields of 1970s Cambodia, from the Great Famine of fourteenth-century Europe to the famine in Niger in 2005. He enriches our understanding of the most crucial and far-reaching aspects of famine, including the roles that population pressure, public policy, and human agency play in causing famine; how food markets can mitigate famine or make it worse; famine's long-term demographic consequences; and the successes and failures of globalized disaster relief. Ó Gráda demonstrates the central role famine has played in the economic and political histories of places as different as Ukraine under Stalin, 1940s Bengal, and Mao's China. And he examines the prospects of a world free of famine.
This is the most comprehensive history of famine available, and is required reading for anyone concerned with issues of economic development and world poverty.
Combining powerful storytelling with the latest evidence from economics and history, Ó Gráda explores the causes and profound consequences of famine over the past five millennia, from ancient Egypt to the killing fields of 1970s Cambodia, from the Great Famine of fourteenth-century Europe to the famine in Niger in 2005. He enriches our understanding of the most crucial and far-reaching aspects of famine, including the roles that population pressure, public policy, and human agency play in causing famine; how food markets can mitigate famine or make it worse; famine's long-term demographic consequences; and the successes and failures of globalized disaster relief. Ó Gráda demonstrates the central role famine has played in the economic and political histories of places as different as Ukraine under Stalin, 1940s Bengal, and Mao's China. And he examines the prospects of a world free of famine.
This is the most comprehensive history of famine available, and is required reading for anyone concerned with issues of economic development and world poverty.
344 pages, Hardcover
First published April 2, 2009
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Displaying 1 - 7 of 7 reviews
October 25, 2022
A book that makes clear that famine doesn’t deserve its own horse come the apocalypse but should be getting a backie on War’s steed.
I’m not sure it’s a surprise to anyone that famine per se is not very common and not as deadly, in terms of people dying as a result of starvation, as one might be led to believe. Crop failure is rare as a cause in comparison to war (the major cause) and tyrannical leader and yet, particularly in the last 50 years or so this inconvenient truth has been masked by reports of no rain leading to mass deaths.
Truly devastating levels of starvation seen in China’s Great Leap Forward, 1940’s Bengal and WWII’s siege of Leningrad are all results of war – man’s inhumanity to man, yet does this knowledge of it being a man-made issue tug at the heartstrings in the same way as poor emaciated children on death’s door because the rains didn’t come? A small starving Ethiopian baby is more likely to elicit pity than stories of “starving children in China gathering at Yunjing bus station in hopes of eating the vomit off long distance buses” , though I know which one I find more disturbing. It is easier to donate to a cause where you have no fear that you might be helping prop up the warlord/despot that has created the emergency in the first place. This is an area I would have liked explored a bit more. O Grada touches on it when he talks of Bob Geldof pronouncing that he is indifferent to whether Live Aid money maintains the corrupt regime as long as people are fed – an understandable view but one that has the west providing endless sticking plasters to the abused child rather than changing the nanny. Also interesting was o Grada’s comment that NGOs have a vested interest in famines and so tend to ignore the signs of oncoming food shortages in favour of alarmist (and wildly overstated) predictions on how many deaths will be on our conscience if we do not open up our purses.
“It is an uncomfortable truth – all too familiar to NGOs – that soliciting sympathy and funding for once-off disaster relief is easier than obtaining relief for endemic malnutrition or disease.”
The subject might be bleak but there is something remarkable in human resilience and the ingenuity that comes from necessity producing food from whatever is available. In an age of bad press, reading about the Russians during the siege of their city does fill me with admiration for their values and strength. Can you imagine if the whole world had even an iota of this sentiment:
“But I wanted to say that even though it was so deadly cold, and almost everyone’s windows were broken, even then not one Leningrader cut down a living tree. No one ever did that. Because we loved our city, and we could not deprive it of its greenery…They could tear down a fence, break up some kiosk, tear off an outer door. But they couldn’t saw down a tree.”
A good book; measured and without hyperbole. Even if you are not interested in famine it serves as a reminder that man can inflict unspeakable torture on his fellows. I finish with these lyrics by Tim Rice from Joseph on the subject of famine. For full effect (or horror) imagine them being sung:
“And I’m sure it crossed your mind
What it is you have to find
Find a man to lead you through the famine
With a flair for economic planning”
After yesterday’s political mayhem in the UK I wonder if we should rename the musical Rishi and his amazing too short trousers.
I’m not sure it’s a surprise to anyone that famine per se is not very common and not as deadly, in terms of people dying as a result of starvation, as one might be led to believe. Crop failure is rare as a cause in comparison to war (the major cause) and tyrannical leader and yet, particularly in the last 50 years or so this inconvenient truth has been masked by reports of no rain leading to mass deaths.
Truly devastating levels of starvation seen in China’s Great Leap Forward, 1940’s Bengal and WWII’s siege of Leningrad are all results of war – man’s inhumanity to man, yet does this knowledge of it being a man-made issue tug at the heartstrings in the same way as poor emaciated children on death’s door because the rains didn’t come? A small starving Ethiopian baby is more likely to elicit pity than stories of “starving children in China gathering at Yunjing bus station in hopes of eating the vomit off long distance buses” , though I know which one I find more disturbing. It is easier to donate to a cause where you have no fear that you might be helping prop up the warlord/despot that has created the emergency in the first place. This is an area I would have liked explored a bit more. O Grada touches on it when he talks of Bob Geldof pronouncing that he is indifferent to whether Live Aid money maintains the corrupt regime as long as people are fed – an understandable view but one that has the west providing endless sticking plasters to the abused child rather than changing the nanny. Also interesting was o Grada’s comment that NGOs have a vested interest in famines and so tend to ignore the signs of oncoming food shortages in favour of alarmist (and wildly overstated) predictions on how many deaths will be on our conscience if we do not open up our purses.
“It is an uncomfortable truth – all too familiar to NGOs – that soliciting sympathy and funding for once-off disaster relief is easier than obtaining relief for endemic malnutrition or disease.”
The subject might be bleak but there is something remarkable in human resilience and the ingenuity that comes from necessity producing food from whatever is available. In an age of bad press, reading about the Russians during the siege of their city does fill me with admiration for their values and strength. Can you imagine if the whole world had even an iota of this sentiment:
“But I wanted to say that even though it was so deadly cold, and almost everyone’s windows were broken, even then not one Leningrader cut down a living tree. No one ever did that. Because we loved our city, and we could not deprive it of its greenery…They could tear down a fence, break up some kiosk, tear off an outer door. But they couldn’t saw down a tree.”
A good book; measured and without hyperbole. Even if you are not interested in famine it serves as a reminder that man can inflict unspeakable torture on his fellows. I finish with these lyrics by Tim Rice from Joseph on the subject of famine. For full effect (or horror) imagine them being sung:
“And I’m sure it crossed your mind
What it is you have to find
Find a man to lead you through the famine
With a flair for economic planning”
After yesterday’s political mayhem in the UK I wonder if we should rename the musical Rishi and his amazing too short trousers.
February 19, 2013
Reading about famine in a coffeehouse is always an exercise in gratitude—glad I’m not facing food insecurity. This was rec’d as the best history of famines and it is certainly a disturbing overview. One thing that astonished me is the degree to which social scientists can report with confidence estimates of deaths from centuries ago. Item: Women survive famines more than men. The author, a historian of Irish economics, compares the causes and severity of famines—from Ireland in the 1840s to Bengal in the 1940s—far too many recorded famines than I imagined. I would have like to have read more about the role of states’ policies, esp from Communism and colonialism, “workhouses” and indifferent elites. What is missing is the barrage of horror stories one finds in say, Davis’s traumatizing book Late Victorian Holocausts. Because of this, O Grada throws around figures (only so many thousand deaths) that become mere numbers in the sweep of sweeping history. Even given this, an excellent book.
May 13, 2011
Not the most thorough history, but a accessible overview of recent famines & Irish famines, and the literature and competing theories about how they occur, mostly from an economic perspective. "Famine" here is very distinct from chronic food insecurity and malnutrition, contrasting with other books I've read that consider famine to be an extreme form of seasonal hunger. Grada challenges a few accepted theories that dominate (I think everyone who writes about famine feels compelled to challenge Sen but not give up on him). I wasn't convinced by a lot of the opnion here, but the collection was nice.
August 27, 2023
I'm kind of conflicted with this book. While it draws more from the Malthusian tradition than that tradition deserves, and the prose is a little boring/superficial, the book provides a good overview of famine, and particularly how famines have changed between before and after 1900. Would recommend, particularly for any historians.
January 9, 2021
O Grada doesn't have the best grasp on Sen's entitlements framework here, but nonetheless, this is a useful short history of famines.
Displaying 1 - 7 of 7 reviews