Beginning in 1948, the Soviet Union launched a series of wildly ambitious projects to implement Joseph Stalin’s vision of a total “transformation of nature.” By the time of Stalin’s death, however, these attempts at “transformation” had proven a spectacular failure. This richly detailed volume, In the Name of the Great Work follows the history of such projects in three communist states—Poland, Hungary, and Czechoslovakia—and explores their varied, but largely disastrous, consequences.

The 2015 edition examines what we think we know about environmental damage and the hidden threats to sustainability we need to recognize.

This case study of deforested land in northern Minnesota, transformed by the lumber industry during the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, shows how differently institutions and individuals can think about climate and ecology when examining the connection between migration and climate.

This article reflects on the Knechtsand, a sandbank in the estuary of the Weser, that served as a bombing range for the British and American air forces stationed in England in 1952. It examines the locals’ protests historically and uncovers strands of tradition that are hugely significant for our understanding of the Wadden Sea and the expanding conservation regime.