Hand of Man or Hand of Fate? The Role of Environment in the Lebanese Famine of World War I

With a traditional narrative rich in villains and victims, the causal impact of environment and climate has been largely lost in the historical account of the famine that stuck the populations of Lebanon and western Syria during World War I.  Central to the theme of this plot has been the notion that the famine was orchestrated by Turkish officials, Beiruti merchants and civil servants, whose vengeful policies, avarice and corruption drove the region to the brink of annihilation. Recent scholarship on the issue has raised questions about the validity of these characterizations, but to date few have questioned the basic assumption of the narrative – that the famine could have been prevented if not for the actions of a few well-placed individuals. However, analysis of the relationship of climate, environmental crisis and famine in the decades preceding WWI suggests that even without the conflict, the region was primed for dearth in the years 1915-1916. In this paper I argue that the social and political actions that have been the primary focus of the historiography have far greater meaning when viewed in the context of the climatic and environmental circumstances of the period. Statistical analysis of climatic data from the Syrian Protestant College’s Lee Observatory and price data taken from the Yohanna Maroun Monastery closely correlate the environmental crisis, climate and the market fluctuations that drove the country to starvation by early 1916. These, in conjunction with short-sighted agricultural policies transformed a manageable short-term famine into a self-reinforcing long term calamity. This interpretation does not absolve human actors of blame. Rather, it locates their decisions within the vicious social and economic dynamic that had been reshaped by the previously undetected undercurrents of the famine period.