Book ID: CBB454439004

London: Water and the Making of the Modern City (2013)

unapi

Broich, John (Author)


University of Pittsburgh Press


Publication Date: 2013
Physical Details: 214
Language: English

As people crowded into British cities in the nineteenth century, industrial and biological waste byproducts and then epidemic followed. Britons died by the thousands in recurring plagues. Figures like Edwin Chadwick and John Snow pleaded for measures that could save lives and preserve the social fabric. The solution that prevailed was the novel idea that British towns must build public water supplies, replacing private companies. But the idea was not an obvious or inevitable one. Those who promoted new waterworks argued that they could use water to realize a new kind of British society - a productive social machine, a new moral community, and a modern civilization. They did not merely cite the dangers of epidemic or scarcity. Despite many debates and conflicts, this vision won out - in town after town, from Birmingham to Liverpool to Edinburgh, authorities gained new powers to execute municipal water systems. But in London local government responded to environmental pressures with a plan intended to help remake the metropolis into a collectivist society. The Conservative national government, in turn, sought to impose a water administration over the region that would achieve its own competing political and social goals. The contestants over London's water supply matched divergent strategies for administering London's water with contending visions of modern society. And the matter was never pedestrian. The struggle over these visions was joined by some of the most colorful figures of the late Victorian period, including John Burns, Lord Salisbury, Bernard Shaw, and Sidney and Beatrice Webb. As Broich demonstrates, the debate over how to supply London with water came to a head when the climate itself forced the endgame near the end of the nineteenth century. At that decisive moment, the Conservative party succeeded in dictating the relationship between water, power, and society in London for many decades to come.

...More
Reviewed By

Review Leslie Tomory (January 2017) Review of "London: Water and the Making of the Modern City". Technology and Culture (pp. 264-265). unapi

Citation URI
https://data.isiscb.org/isis/citation/CBB454439004/

Similar Citations

Book Melosi, Martin V.; (2011)
Precious Commodity: Providing Water for America's Cities (/isis/citation/CBB001212518/)

Thesis Peterson, Maya Karin; (2011)
Technologies of Rule: Empire, Water, and the Modernization of Central Asia, 1867--1941 (/isis/citation/CBB001567280/)

Book Matthew Gandy; (2014)
The fabric of space: Water, modernity, and the urban imagination (/isis/citation/CBB322385433/)

Article Taylor, Vanessa; Trentmann, Frank; (2011)
Liquid Politics: Water and the Politics of Everyday Life in the Modern City (/isis/citation/CBB001200335/)

Book Guldi, Jo; (2012)
Roads to Power: Britain Invents the Infrastructure State (/isis/citation/CBB001212551/)

Article Daigger, Glen; (Spring 2011)
Sustainable Urban Water and Resource Management (/isis/citation/CBB002951504/)

Article Gustavo Gil Gasiola; Juliano Marcal Lopes; Augusto Ferreira Brandao Junior; Eduardo Mario Dias; (March 2019)
Smart Cities through Smart Regulation (/isis/citation/CBB814285147/)

Chapter Melosi, Martin V.; (2003)
How Bad Theory Can Lead to Good Technology: Water Supply and Sewerage in the Age of Miasmas (/isis/citation/CBB000774718/)

Article Moa Carlsson; (April 2022)
Computing views, remodeling environments (/isis/citation/CBB726932342/)

Book Matthew V. Bender; (2019)
Water brings no harm : management knowledge and the struggle for the waters of Kilimanjaro (/isis/citation/CBB806270320/)

Article Mike Michael; (June 2020)
London’s fatbergs and affective infrastructuring (/isis/citation/CBB218635362/)

Book Tim Stroshane; (2016)
Drought, Water Law, and the Origins of California's Central Valley Project (/isis/citation/CBB260419535/)

Authors & Contributors
Melosi, Martin V.
Daigger, Glen T.
Stroshane, Tim
Augusto Ferreira Brandao Junior
Moa Carlsson
Eduardo Mario Dias
Concepts
Water supply
Water resource management
Urban planning
Infrastructure
Technology and government
Sewerage
Time Periods
19th century
21st century
20th century
20th century, late
20th century, early
18th century
Places
United States
Great Britain
London (England)
Los Angeles (California)
Philadelphia, PA
Lagos, Nigeria
Comments

Be the first to comment!

{{ comment.created_by.username }} on {{ comment.created_on | date:'medium' }}

Log in or register to comment