The anthropocene contract : what kind of historian-reader agreement does environmental historiography need?

The paper is an attempt to reply to the question on how environmental history can participate in public debates on contemporary world concerns in a reliable and socially relevant way. I argue that the answer to this question lies in environmental history's reading pact, which I call the Anthropocene contract. Its most important element is the principle of equality, which concerns the relationship between historians and their readers. In the first step, I invoke Graeme Wynn's statement to point to important questions about the challenges that the Anthropocene posed to environmental history. Next I critically discuss the answers to these questions provided by historical theory. I then formulate a proposal for a reading pact of environmental history using the theoretical insights of Kalle Pihlainen and the philosophy of Jacques Rancière.