Professor of Political and Economic Geography at the University of Tuscia, Fabienne Charlotte Vallino signs Safeguarding Nature, respecting Animals, protecting the Environment, defending the Earth. The Pioneers of Thought of Our Time (Ets, pp. 423, euro 35), a genealogy of ecology – as a science and as a philosophy of the contemporary world: Alexander von Humboldt, Aldo Leopold, Albert Schweitzer, Rachel Carson, John Paul II… , to mention only the most important and illustrious names in international culture. And among them George Perkins Marsh, who had traveled and carried out scientific observations in Italy and throughout the Alpine range, even before arriving, in 1861, in Turin and then in Florence and Rome, as plenipotentiary minister of the United States in the Kingdom of ‘Italy.
In an international arbitration involving Italy and Switzerland, Marsh will introduce the principle of safeguarding the natural environment.
Professor Vallino, Marsh finds a united Italy, but already in environmental degradation.
“Not even areas of northern Italy were overlooked where, alongside the flooding of the water courses, along the strip at the foot of the pre-Alpine mountains, a drastic decrease in the water from the springs and the the disappearance of natural fountains”.
What did Marsh propose?
“The ‘restoration of forests’ as the beginning of a ‘physical reconstruction’ of lands degraded by human action in nations with a far-sighted policy, which required a culture shared by citizens: stewardship, not pure exploitation, of nature”.
“At the beginning of the 20th century – said Giuseppe Prezzolini – I noticed from the train that in Switzerland the farmers cleaned the cows, in Italy they didn’t”…
The environment was and is widely considered negligible.
“The relationship between man and nature had to be understood differently by public administrators and people. Or, the recovery interventions that had been carried out would have been followed by a new reckless exploitation. This was one of the underlying ideas in Marsh’s work as super arbiter in a diplomatic issue in 1874 between the Kingdom of Italy and the Swiss Confederation, relating to the Alpe di Cravairola, which had been under dispute between the Ossolani and Ticinesi since the mid-17th century”.
In summary?
“The Alpe di Cravairola is located along the eastern slope of the watershed between the Antigorio valley (Italian) and the Valmaggia (Swiss). The largest inhabited center of the Antigorio valley, Crodo (16 km north of Domodossola) and the citizens of Ossola had possession of the area for centuries, exploiting the timber and grazing land. The Canton of Ticino claimed the Alp by right of conquest in the 16th century”.
Italian motivations?
“Essentially the protection of the property rights of Italian communities.”
Swiss motivations?
“Above all, the correct use and management of forestry assets and surface water, as well as preventing and stopping soil erosion. What was neglected by the Italians, with heavy repercussions on the territory on both sides, Swiss and Italian.”
How did Marsh find his way?
“He made his own the Swiss complaints about the poor management of the territory by the Italians and about the improvident actions of the Italian land owners, with the serious consequences on the natural environment, over a wide geographical range up to Lake Maggiore. Furthermore, he reported his personal observations on the Italian disinterest in these issues”.
Unusual considerations at that time. But what was the referee’s verdict?
“Despite adhering to Switzerland’s reasons for the preservation of nature, overcoming its inclination to operate according to a perspective of opportunity, Marsh accepted the Italian thesis that the historical-archival documentation produced for the Arbitration had proven. In fact, the Italian possessions on the Alpe di Cravairola preceded the Swiss conquest”.
And the Alpe di Cravairola passed like this…
“… To be part of the territory of the Kingdom of Italy. The decree for the execution of the award was adopted by the Swiss Federal Council and signed in Bern by the President of the Confederation, Johann J. Scherer, on 4 January 1875”.
So Marsh…
“… An innovator, he officially brought into the diplomatic and legal debate the issue of the degradation of nature and its consequences, the need to preserve and protect the natural system and to adopt legal measures for the protection of the territory. Marsh’s body of work, including this work, makes him one of the great pioneers of the subsequent Conservation Movement and Environmental Movement.”
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