Environmentalism

Environmentalism is a broad movement concerned with protecting nature, wildlife, clean air and water, and a stable climate. Britannica describes it as a political and ethical movement that seeks to improve and protect the quality of the natural environment. It is wider than any single party. People from the left, the center and the right can be environmentalists, although they often disagree about the best methods. Some focus on saving wild places, others on pollution, public health or climate change.

Modern environmentalism grew from nineteenth century concerns about industrial pollution and the loss of wilderness. Henry David Thoreau wrote about simple living close to nature in Walden in 1854. John Muir helped found the Sierra Club in 1892 and campaigned for national parks in the United States. Aldo Leopold proposed a land ethic in A Sand County Almanac, published in 1949. Rachel Carson's Silent Spring in 1962 raised public concern about pesticides and is widely seen as a turning point. The first Earth Day was held in 1970, and the United Nations held its first major environmental conference in Stockholm in 1972. In Kenya, Wangari Maathai founded the Green Belt Movement in 1977 to plant trees and support rural women, and she received the Nobel Peace Prize in 2004.

Conservationists want to manage natural resources wisely for long-term human use, while preservationists want to keep some areas of nature untouched. Deep ecology, a term introduced by Arne Naess, holds that nature has value in itself, not only for human use. Environmental justice focuses on how pollution and climate effects fall more heavily on poor communities and minorities. Market or free-market environmentalism favors property rights, pricing and trading systems. Ecomodernism argues that technology, such as nuclear energy and intensive farming, can reduce human pressure on nature. Ecofeminism links the treatment of nature with the treatment of women.

Critics on the right argue that environmental regulation can be costly, slow economic growth, raise prices and reduce property rights, and some question how urgent specific threats are. Some economists who favor markets argue that innovation and growth have historically solved many environmental problems. Critics on the left argue that mainstream environmentalism often ignores class and global inequality, and that market tools can let wealthy polluters pay to continue. People in developing countries have sometimes argued that rich countries, which industrialized first, now ask poorer countries to limit their own growth.

Environmentalism has led to major laws and institutions. The United States created the Environmental Protection Agency in 1970 and passed laws on clean air and water. The Montreal Protocol of 1987 phased out most chemicals that damage the ozone layer. The Paris Agreement of 2015 set a framework for countries to reduce greenhouse gas emissions. Many countries have national parks, recycling programs, emission standards and environmental impact assessments for large projects. Environmental groups also influence policy through lawsuits, campaigns and consumer choices.