“Knowledge is not made for understanding; it is made for cutting.” With these words, Michel Foucault famously epitomized his genealogical approach to history half a century ago. On Barak in his Powering Empire: How Coal Made the Middle East and Sparked Global Carbonization (2020), in the Foucaultian tradition, takes a scalpel to all the supposed historical truisms of energy history severing at the source the tentacular spread of the ideological energy regimes across both historical and contemporary timeframes and geographies. Barak once again showcases the meticulous research and human-centric narrative that made his previous book, On Time: Technology and Temporality in Modern Egypt (2013), a standout work. Just as he masterfully balanced human experience with theory in his exploration of technopolitics in Egypt, Barak continues to delightfully weave human stories into his latest work, demonstrating his unparalleled ability to merge history, theory, and the intricacies of material culture studies. He successfully produces an original materialist history that does not fall prey to the lazy determinism of many energy scholars. Barak shows — through broad-brush analysis, extensive contextualization, and the examination of the most minute and benign primary sources — how human agents nonlinearly adopted new socio-cultural practices that imbued coal with this vitalic narrative. Through this method, Barak successfully provincializes energy.

Barak’s work begins with the “specter of energy” that haunts the field of energy studies (p. 24). He takes aim at several well-known names in the field including John McNeil’s concept of the “energy regime, the collection of arrangements whereby energy is harvested from the sun (or uranium atoms), directed, stored, bought, sold, used for work or wasted, and ultimately dissipated;” as well as Kenneth Pomeranz’s concept of the “great divergence” (p. 24). He, clearly a well-versed Foucaultian, knows an overly simplistic narrative when he sees one: he attacks the periodization of the “ages of” each respective energy source and the neat division between the modern/industrial and the agricultural eras as artificial and false distinctions. He shows that the modern, industrial, coal-powered world was reliant on the third world’s agriculturalism, complicating the industrial/agricultural dichotomy, and that the mechanics of imperialism, racism, and domination were tools in maintaining this industro-agricultural symbiosis (p. 126).Barak makes his arguments not only through grand theorizing but through the oft-neglected practicalities and specifics of the steamship and coal-powered ecosystem. At one point he examines in detail the journey of the Hugh Lindsay, a ship constructed to assess the practicability of Red Sea steam navigation in 1830 (p. 121). He meticulously details the daily logistics of the ships' coal resupply and the significant weight challenges associated with acquiring fresh coal. From the lessons of the journey of this specific and early node in the steamship network, he is able to extrapolate the mechanics of the broader energy system and how it would develop: finding in this story the seeds of the advancements in engine technology (which solved the weight issue by reusing the same steam two or later even three times) as well as in hydrography, lighthouses, and other signaling schemes that assisted with maneuverability in the reef-studded Red Sea (p. 121). Barak utilizes this sort of jeux d’échelles — scaling micro, time-specific observations to macro systems that sprawl across space and time — throughout his book to great and convincing effect.

Barak's meticulous research approach is evident not only in his examination of broad themes but also in his deep dives into specific historical documents, showcased by his laboring through the journal entries of business men and dust-covered industry compendiums (the 19th century equivalents of the paper-bin-bound Goldman Sachs analyst reports on the energy industry). He combed through David Alfred Thomas’ The Growth and Direction of Our Foreign Trade in Coal during the Last Half Century (published 1903) to find a quote on the proportional breakdown of England’s coal exports relative to other goods (p. 127). With the import/export business having been satirized in the present-day popular imagination (by the likes of Seinfeld, for example), Barak’s willingness to dig through shipping logs, telegraph line maps, and (primitive) statistical studies of the coal trade displays a certain dedication to his craft that is commendable, if not exhausting to consider the magnitude of.

Still, even Barak’s high-level systemic thinking is not pure speculation: he backs up his claims with copious amounts of data, which being of a somewhat distant historical period is notoriously hard to come by. One chart serves as a compendium of the average yearly coal volumes at five ports (Malta, Alexandria, Port Said, Aden, and Singapore) during the 1850s, 70s, and 90s (the trend [as you might be able to guess] is up, with an especial jump in volumes in the 1890s) (p. 125). Another depicts the decrease in expenditure of coal per indicated horsepower per hour based on good average practice and the increase in steam pressures from 1830 to 1889 (p. 124). Barak's use of detailed data sets him apart from typical sociological histories that often lean on broad, abstract narratives. While he draws inspiration from Foucault's deconstructivist approach, he avoids letting it consume every historical perspective in a nihilistic black hole. Instead, he offers a refreshing contribution to the discipline by grounding his work in tangible data, historical context, and avoiding anachronism.

Barak in all his detailed descriptions of globe-spanning logistical networks and technological nuances does not lose sight of, and even emphasizes the humans integral to this whole material system. In the vein of Marx and Thompson and Braverman, Barak deconstructs the neat industrial revolution narrative whereby human labor was suddenly automated bringing about great productivity gains and reducing human labor and suffering. He emphasizes the role of the quantifiable measurement of output, a benchmark by which both humans and machines were measured, leading to an escalatory cycle in which “the more machines mimicked living things and performed human tasks, the more humans and their labor could be measured against machines” (p. 84). Barak illustrates that machines, often perceived as having their own inherent vitality like coal or other energy sources, are actually infused with life through the efforts and energies of human laborers. This realization builds on Barak’s mission of demystifying the objects of industrialization and identifying their socio-cultural origins.

In academia today, we often see specific objects or groups scapegoated for the evils of imperialism, racism, and climate change. Barak critiques postcolonial studies for vilifying the European human male specifically and science and technology studies for vigorously promoting “post-human” actors and perspectives (p. 235). More sophomoric forms of these same disciplines may blame straight white men for all of society’s oppressions and dirty fossil fuels for the degradation of the environment. As Barak states, “there is nothing inherent in fossil fuels that flames intercommunal tension, securitization, abandonment, or the financialization of the future. Hydrocarbons alone do not even cause global warming” (p. 22), so too can it be said that all of society’s oppression cannot be blamed on Western white cis-gender men. Both these material objects and human actors are not inherently vehicles or agents of imperialism and environmental degradation; they sit at the intersection of “material features, religious and imperial trends, capitalism, and racism” (p. 22), and are thus imbued with such harmful ideologies. Barak's primary objective in his book is to shift the perception of coal from being an inherently evil entity to focusing on the socio-cultural mechanisms that influenced and were influenced by coal; but perhaps it can be said that he is attempting to do something even more radical: to remove a degree of the guilt that has been placed on the human actors in this tentacular system of imperialism and to instead attack the underlying ideologies and cultural drivers that infected the minds of these agents and consumed and were were both fueled by and consumed energy resources. Only by doing such a historical oncologic excision can we prevent the cancer of imperialism, oppression, and environmental degradation from continuing to metastasize in the present. The scapegoatery-promoting disciplines, in an effort to take on the monumental present-day challenge of climate change, lazily suck the humanity and culture out of the grand historical ark (Nietzsche might call them life-denying religions) focussing on dead objects and impersonal relations. Barak introduces a fresh viewpoint, emphasizing the humanities' emphasis on ethics and storytelling, and their capacity to question established norms. He suggests that these qualities are crucial in forging an "energy humanities" discipline (p. 234). This new field could bridge the gap, making the complex realities of climate change and its socio-cultural foundations more comprehensible..

In his book, Barak adopts a unique thematic structure that feels more reminiscent of chapters from "Avatar: The Last Airbender" than a conventional academic history book. Instead of a linear, chronological progression, Barak opts for chapter titles like "Water," "Animals," and "Humans," emphasizing a holistic and interconnected approach to the history of energy. This thematic structure allows him to delve deeply into each element's multifaceted relationship with energy and empire, challenging deterministic narratives that might prioritize one form of energy over another. By separating "Humans" and "Animals" into distinct chapters, Barak underscores their individual agency and roles in energy history. His materialist approach, evident in the chapter titles, offers a nuanced perspective that moves away from strict determinism, highlighting the tangible aspects of energy history while showcasing its complexities. Chapters like "Risk" and "Environment" broaden the discussion to include the wider implications of energy choices, from potential dangers (and the financialization of that risk) to environmental impacts. By eschewing a strict chronological format, Barak weaves a rich, interconnected narrative that offers a comprehensive and nuanced view of energy's role in shaping empires and civilizations. The sheer ambition and complexity of his discourse — fragmented and abstract like a cubist painting — faces the danger of falling into total disarray and reader-confoundment, but through this organization, Barak skillfully weaves his narrative, ensuring the reader remains anchored and engaged in each of his detailed examinations.

There is incessant talk today of an energy transition: a neat progression from legacy fossil fuels to renewable energy sources. Through his analysis, Barak demonstrates that such a transition has never truly taken place historically, and he suggests that not only is it improbable for such a transition to occur in the present, but it's even less likely to be a fair and equitable one. In chapter four, Barak challenges the widely accepted idea that the steam engine immediately replaced the water mill as soon as its enhanced productivity became evident (as one might anticipate from a liberal economist's perspective). He shows that, on the contrary, the water mill was superior to the steam engine for most of the 19th century and that its only advantage, which proved most impactful, was that the nature of the operation of the steam engine allowed factory owners to better manage their unruly workers (p. 87). Those who support climate justice approach new renewable energy sources with a similar naïveté. Barak in the conclusion cautions against simplifying the quest for climate justice as a one-size-fits-all solution, emphasizing that (like similar historical solutions) the tools for achieving it are intertwined with the problems they aim to address. He demonstrates that the pursuit of climate justice doesn't always align with their purported anti-imperialist, anti-capitalist, or anti-racist agendas. The dual role of coal in fostering solidarity within British mining communities while also exacerbating divisions globally exemplifies how such transitions can have unforeseen and significant repercussions. Just as coal shaped inter-communal relations, food systems, and ecological interactions in unexpected ways, so too are the future down-stream effects of renewable energy adoption unknown, and there will be, as Barak states, “winners and losers, for example in the exposure of weaker members of the global society to possible rising fuel or food costs.” He continues, “the fact that multiple global entanglements have been fossilized means that fully retracing carbon footprints will often be not only very difficult, but also extremely harmful and unfair” (p. 230).

Deterministic narratives, the imbuement of energy sources with natural properties, the brash dividing up and categorization of history all have dangerous implications for the present. Barak in Powering Empire takes a sledge hammer to these false dichotomies, the oversimplified narratives, the socio-cultural underpinnings of imperialism and the global energy complex. In the vein of Timothy Mitchell’s Carbon Democracy (2013) and in contention with the modern-exceptionalist histories of Vaclav Smil, Barak rewrites the history of coal, demolishing our misconceptions of this energy source and its contemporary counterparts. His fresh take on energy history is a desperate effort to prevent these ideological cancers from recurring in the present, no matter the apparent nobility of the latest energy source. The question is whether, in our rapidly intensifying and polarized world, anyone has the patience for the nuanced insights of Barak's work, or if we are already barreling down some seemingly positive but ultimately misleading narrative that, as has happened historically, will result in unevenly distributed suffering in the future.

This was written originally for my Approaches to International/Global History Class with Adam Tooze.

I’m very tempted to upload the PDF I have of the book to arweave so all my loyal subscribers can have access to this great piece of writing, but it’s probably not worth the risk so I just put in the JSTOR link.

“Knowledge is not made for understanding; it is made for cutting.” With these words, Michel Foucault famously epitomized his genealogical approach to history half a century ago. On Barak in his Powering Empire: How Coal Made the Middle East and Sparked Global Carbonization (2020), in the Foucaultian tradition, takes a scalpel to all the supposed historical truisms of energy history severing at the source the tentacular spread of the ideological energy regimes across both historical and contemporary timeframes and geographies. Barak once again showcases the meticulous research and human-centric narrative that made his previous book, On Time: Technology and Temporality in Modern Egypt (2013), a standout work. Just as he masterfully balanced human experience with theory in his exploration of technopolitics in Egypt, Barak continues to delightfully weave human stories into his latest work, demonstrating his unparalleled ability to merge history, theory, and the intricacies of material culture studies. He successfully produces an original materialist history that does not fall prey to the lazy determinism of many energy scholars. Barak shows — through broad-brush analysis, extensive contextualization, and the examination of the most minute and benign primary sources — how human agents nonlinearly adopted new socio-cultural practices that imbued coal with this vitalic narrative. Through this method, Barak successfully provincializes energy.

Barak’s work begins with the “specter of energy” that haunts the field of energy studies (p. 24). He takes aim at several well-known names in the field including John McNeil’s concept of the “energy regime, the collection of arrangements whereby energy is harvested from the sun (or uranium atoms), directed, stored, bought, sold, used for work or wasted, and ultimately dissipated;” as well as Kenneth Pomeranz’s concept of the “great divergence” (p. 24). He, clearly a well-versed Foucaultian, knows an overly simplistic narrative when he sees one: he attacks the periodization of the “ages of” each respective energy source and the neat division between the modern/industrial and the agricultural eras as artificial and false distinctions. He shows that the modern, industrial, coal-powered world was reliant on the third world’s agriculturalism, complicating the industrial/agricultural dichotomy, and that the mechanics of imperialism, racism, and domination were tools in maintaining this industro-agricultural symbiosis (p. 126).Barak makes his arguments not only through grand theorizing but through the oft-neglected practicalities and specifics of the steamship and coal-powered ecosystem. At one point he examines in detail the journey of the Hugh Lindsay, a ship constructed to assess the practicability of Red Sea steam navigation in 1830 (p. 121). He meticulously details the daily logistics of the ships' coal resupply and the significant weight challenges associated with acquiring fresh coal. From the lessons of the journey of this specific and early node in the steamship network, he is able to extrapolate the mechanics of the broader energy system and how it would develop: finding in this story the seeds of the advancements in engine technology (which solved the weight issue by reusing the same steam two or later even three times) as well as in hydrography, lighthouses, and other signaling schemes that assisted with maneuverability in the reef-studded Red Sea (p. 121). Barak utilizes this sort of jeux d’échelles — scaling micro, time-specific observations to macro systems that sprawl across space and time — throughout his book to great and convincing effect.

Barak's meticulous research approach is evident not only in his examination of broad themes but also in his deep dives into specific historical documents, showcased by his laboring through the journal entries of business men and dust-covered industry compendiums (the 19th century equivalents of the paper-bin-bound Goldman Sachs analyst reports on the energy industry). He combed through David Alfred Thomas’ The Growth and Direction of Our Foreign Trade in Coal during the Last Half Century (published 1903) to find a quote on the proportional breakdown of England’s coal exports relative to other goods (p. 127). With the import/export business having been satirized in the present-day popular imagination (by the likes of Seinfeld, for example), Barak’s willingness to dig through shipping logs, telegraph line maps, and (primitive) statistical studies of the coal trade displays a certain dedication to his craft that is commendable, if not exhausting to consider the magnitude of.

Still, even Barak’s high-level systemic thinking is not pure speculation: he backs up his claims with copious amounts of data, which being of a somewhat distant historical period is notoriously hard to come by. One chart serves as a compendium of the average yearly coal volumes at five ports (Malta, Alexandria, Port Said, Aden, and Singapore) during the 1850s, 70s, and 90s (the trend [as you might be able to guess] is up, with an especial jump in volumes in the 1890s) (p. 125). Another depicts the decrease in expenditure of coal per indicated horsepower per hour based on good average practice and the increase in steam pressures from 1830 to 1889 (p. 124). Barak's use of detailed data sets him apart from typical sociological histories that often lean on broad, abstract narratives. While he draws inspiration from Foucault's deconstructivist approach, he avoids letting it consume every historical perspective in a nihilistic black hole. Instead, he offers a refreshing contribution to the discipline by grounding his work in tangible data, historical context, and avoiding anachronism.

Barak in all his detailed descriptions of globe-spanning logistical networks and technological nuances does not lose sight of, and even emphasizes the humans integral to this whole material system. In the vein of Marx and Thompson and Braverman, Barak deconstructs the neat industrial revolution narrative whereby human labor was suddenly automated bringing about great productivity gains and reducing human labor and suffering. He emphasizes the role of the quantifiable measurement of output, a benchmark by which both humans and machines were measured, leading to an escalatory cycle in which “the more machines mimicked living things and performed human tasks, the more humans and their labor could be measured against machines” (p. 84). Barak illustrates that machines, often perceived as having their own inherent vitality like coal or other energy sources, are actually infused with life through the efforts and energies of human laborers. This realization builds on Barak’s mission of demystifying the objects of industrialization and identifying their socio-cultural origins.

In academia today, we often see specific objects or groups scapegoated for the evils of imperialism, racism, and climate change. Barak critiques postcolonial studies for vilifying the European human male specifically and science and technology studies for vigorously promoting “post-human” actors and perspectives (p. 235). More sophomoric forms of these same disciplines may blame straight white men for all of society’s oppressions and dirty fossil fuels for the degradation of the environment. As Barak states, “there is nothing inherent in fossil fuels that flames intercommunal tension, securitization, abandonment, or the financialization of the future. Hydrocarbons alone do not even cause global warming” (p. 22), so too can it be said that all of society’s oppression cannot be blamed on Western white cis-gender men. Both these material objects and human actors are not inherently vehicles or agents of imperialism and environmental degradation; they sit at the intersection of “material features, religious and imperial trends, capitalism, and racism” (p. 22), and are thus imbued with such harmful ideologies. Barak's primary objective in his book is to shift the perception of coal from being an inherently evil entity to focusing on the socio-cultural mechanisms that influenced and were influenced by coal; but perhaps it can be said that he is attempting to do something even more radical: to remove a degree of the guilt that has been placed on the human actors in this tentacular system of imperialism and to instead attack the underlying ideologies and cultural drivers that infected the minds of these agents and consumed and were were both fueled by and consumed energy resources. Only by doing such a historical oncologic excision can we prevent the cancer of imperialism, oppression, and environmental degradation from continuing to metastasize in the present. The scapegoatery-promoting disciplines, in an effort to take on the monumental present-day challenge of climate change, lazily suck the humanity and culture out of the grand historical ark (Nietzsche might call them life-denying religions) focussing on dead objects and impersonal relations. Barak introduces a fresh viewpoint, emphasizing the humanities' emphasis on ethics and storytelling, and their capacity to question established norms. He suggests that these qualities are crucial in forging an "energy humanities" discipline (p. 234). This new field could bridge the gap, making the complex realities of climate change and its socio-cultural foundations more comprehensible..

In his book, Barak adopts a unique thematic structure that feels more reminiscent of chapters from "Avatar: The Last Airbender" than a conventional academic history book. Instead of a linear, chronological progression, Barak opts for chapter titles like "Water," "Animals," and "Humans," emphasizing a holistic and interconnected approach to the history of energy. This thematic structure allows him to delve deeply into each element's multifaceted relationship with energy and empire, challenging deterministic narratives that might prioritize one form of energy over another. By separating "Humans" and "Animals" into distinct chapters, Barak underscores their individual agency and roles in energy history. His materialist approach, evident in the chapter titles, offers a nuanced perspective that moves away from strict determinism, highlighting the tangible aspects of energy history while showcasing its complexities. Chapters like "Risk" and "Environment" broaden the discussion to include the wider implications of energy choices, from potential dangers (and the financialization of that risk) to environmental impacts. By eschewing a strict chronological format, Barak weaves a rich, interconnected narrative that offers a comprehensive and nuanced view of energy's role in shaping empires and civilizations. The sheer ambition and complexity of his discourse — fragmented and abstract like a cubist painting — faces the danger of falling into total disarray and reader-confoundment, but through this organization, Barak skillfully weaves his narrative, ensuring the reader remains anchored and engaged in each of his detailed examinations.

There is incessant talk today of an energy transition: a neat progression from legacy fossil fuels to renewable energy sources. Through his analysis, Barak demonstrates that such a transition has never truly taken place historically, and he suggests that not only is it improbable for such a transition to occur in the present, but it's even less likely to be a fair and equitable one. In chapter four, Barak challenges the widely accepted idea that the steam engine immediately replaced the water mill as soon as its enhanced productivity became evident (as one might anticipate from a liberal economist's perspective). He shows that, on the contrary, the water mill was superior to the steam engine for most of the 19th century and that its only advantage, which proved most impactful, was that the nature of the operation of the steam engine allowed factory owners to better manage their unruly workers (p. 87). Those who support climate justice approach new renewable energy sources with a similar naïveté. Barak in the conclusion cautions against simplifying the quest for climate justice as a one-size-fits-all solution, emphasizing that (like similar historical solutions) the tools for achieving it are intertwined with the problems they aim to address. He demonstrates that the pursuit of climate justice doesn't always align with their purported anti-imperialist, anti-capitalist, or anti-racist agendas. The dual role of coal in fostering solidarity within British mining communities while also exacerbating divisions globally exemplifies how such transitions can have unforeseen and significant repercussions. Just as coal shaped inter-communal relations, food systems, and ecological interactions in unexpected ways, so too are the future down-stream effects of renewable energy adoption unknown, and there will be, as Barak states, “winners and losers, for example in the exposure of weaker members of the global society to possible rising fuel or food costs.” He continues, “the fact that multiple global entanglements have been fossilized means that fully retracing carbon footprints will often be not only very difficult, but also extremely harmful and unfair” (p. 230).

Deterministic narratives, the imbuement of energy sources with natural properties, the brash dividing up and categorization of history all have dangerous implications for the present. Barak in Powering Empire takes a sledge hammer to these false dichotomies, the oversimplified narratives, the socio-cultural underpinnings of imperialism and the global energy complex. In the vein of Timothy Mitchell’s Carbon Democracy (2013) and in contention with the modern-exceptionalist histories of Vaclav Smil, Barak rewrites the history of coal, demolishing our misconceptions of this energy source and its contemporary counterparts. His fresh take on energy history is a desperate effort to prevent these ideological cancers from recurring in the present, no matter the apparent nobility of the latest energy source. The question is whether, in our rapidly intensifying and polarized world, anyone has the patience for the nuanced insights of Barak's work, or if we are already barreling down some seemingly positive but ultimately misleading narrative that, as has happened historically, will result in unevenly distributed suffering in the future.

This was written originally for my Approaches to International/Global History Class with Adam Tooze.

I’m very tempted to upload the PDF I have of the book to arweave so all my loyal subscribers can have access to this great piece of writing, but it’s probably not worth the risk so I just put in the JSTOR link.