Volkswagen in the Amazon

Antoine Acker earned his Ph.D. at the European University Institute, Florence and has extensively researched and taught in seven different countries on a broad range of topics including environmental and Brazilian history, German culture and language, as well as political sciences. He was a lecturer at the Université de la Sorbonne Nouvelle, Paris (2013–2014), at the Université de La Rochelle, France (2014–2015) and a guest scholar at Universität Bielefeld, Germany, Universiteit Maastricht, The Netherlands and Universität Bern, Switzerland (2015–2016). He is currently a post-doctoral researcher at the Università degli Studi di Torino, Italy in affiliation with the Marie Curie Excellence Fellowships program co-funded by the European Commission.

• 1. Setting the stage: the Amazon as a horizon; 2. The making of a model ranch (1973–1976); 3. Development in the age of scarcity (1976–1983); 4. Out-of-date modernity: forced labor at Cristalino (1983–1986); 5. Cristalino's unhappy ending.

'Acker tells a fascinating story about the rise and fall of Cristalino, Volkswagen's cattle ranch in the Brazilian jungle. He masterfully demonstrates how changing political pressures, cultural misconceptions, a questionable social agenda, and environmental ignorance resulted in the failure of this project. This is a highly topical book, and international environmental history at its very best.' Christof Mauch, Ludwig-Maximilians-Universität München, Germany