Things are toppled a lot higher now than several centuries ago. Population is orders of magnitude higher, and we all get our food from far away places in the world. Those things make a very fragile global ecosystem which is very different to the very localised ones centuries ago.

Back then 2-3 consecutive years of bad harvests meant a major upheaval for a few affected areas. Now that those areas supply food to the whole world the problem has grown in scale and fragility.