Brief history of the environmental movement

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Brief history of the environmental movement
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Population changes over time

• Hunter gatherers
• Agricultural revolution (10,000 years ago) -
  easier to meet nutritional needs
• Industrial revolution (mid-1700s) more urban
  areas with better sanitation and use of fossil
  fuels

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Population predictions

• Thomas Malthus (1800)
• births and deaths will limit population size for
  humans
• Paul Ehlich The Population Bomb (1968)
• Too many people will produce massive conflicts
  and famine

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Limited Resources (1)

• Garrett Hardin Tragedy of the Commons (1968)
• Ecological footprint (see pg. 19)

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Limited Resources (2)

• Sustainability
• Basic concept
• Millennium Ecosystem Assessment
• Key findings? (p. 20)
• Easter Island example

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Environmental ethics

• Values
• Central case Jabiluka Uranium Mine
• Mirrar tribe
• Conflict of culture and economics

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Environmental ethics

• Anthropocentrism
• Impacts on people
• Biocentrism
• Effects on all living things
• Ecocentrism
• Effects on biotic and abiotic communities

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Westward expansion in US

• Exploitation of resources
• Deforestation and environmental degradation
• Emergence of preservation and conservation

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Preservation

• Fundamental right of all organisms to exist
• Protect environment in a pristine, unaltered
  state
• John Muir Sierra Club, established Yosemite and
  Kings Canyon National Park

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Conservation

• Put natural resources to use
• Manage resources wisely
• Greatest good for greatest number of people for
  longest time
• Gifford Pinchot US Forest Service

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Land ethic

• Conservation and preservation
• Land ethic people should treat the land in an
  ethical way
• Ecocentric view
• Aldo Leopold

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Environmental Justice

• Jabiluka Uranium Mine as example
• Poor and underprivileged tend to experience more
  environmental degradation

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Economics a few points

• Subsistence
• Capitalism
• Cost-benefit analyses
• Do ecosystem services have value?
• Is economic grow sustainable?
• Eco-labeling has emerged

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Modern environmentalism

• Fight pollution and its effects
• Human health
• Environmental justice movement
• Many famous environmentalists Rachel Carson
• Intervention in regulatory hearings, books, mass
  media campaigns, law suits and litigation

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Global environmentalism

• Famous photo of Earth from space
• Activities primarily through United Nations
• Links between poverty, oppression, exploitation
  of humans, exploitation of environment