A World History of Rubber: Empire, Industry, and the Everyday

A World History of Rubber helps readers understand and gain new insights into the social and cultural contexts of global production and consumption, from the nineteenth century to today, through the fascinating story of one commodity.

• Divides the coverage into themes of race, migration, and labor; gender on plantations and in factories; demand and everyday consumption; World Wars and nationalism; and resistance and independence
• Highlights the interrelatedness of our world long before the age of globalization and the global social inequalities that persist today
• Discusses key concepts of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, including imperialism, industrialization, racism, and inequality, through the lens of rubber
• Provides an engaging and accessible narrative for all levels that is filled with archival research, illustrations, and maps

Keywords: Second Industrial Revolution; global production; Plantation agriculture; White Man's Burden; imperialism; consumerism; global commodity chain; Goodrich; Dunlop; Michelin; exploitation; Goodyear; Firestone; Bridgestone; neo-colonialism; rubber; World War I; World War II; World History; Twentieth-Century World History; World Wars, Economic History, Economic History