History of Environmentalism

In the 60s a groundbreaking book, titled ‘Silent Spring’, was published in the U.S.A. The book ascribed declining numbers of a birds species and some birds found dead to the effect of pesticides. Sooner the book acquired cult status among the rebellious bourgeois youth of the era along with Scientology and the various hedonistic strands of Marxism that were quite fashionable back then.

With the peaking of rising living standards, following World War 2, in the 70s due to the innovation wheel kick started by the war in the 40s as well as the cold one; redistribution of investment and Marshall project; the influx of dollars; the transformation of social democracy into anti-authoritarianism in general and its focus on humanism and well-being; environmental discourse gained momentum in the 70s due to increasing evidence linking lung, liver, nerval, and kidney problems to power and transportation emissions of compounds of nitrogen, sulfur, ozone; fine particulates, and carbon monoxide as well as the industrial discharge of heavy metals and organic compounds into surface water, and seepage of chemical fertilizers, pesticides, and mining byproducts into underground water resources.

WHO in the 80s adopted evidence linking probable health problems to concentration of pollutants in the environment and accordingly limits for pollutant concentrations were set and tailored in different countries. Nonetheless, the linear increase in life expectancy in Asia, Europe, Australia, North Africa and the Americas somehow countered the evidence though it remains intuitive that lesser concentration of pollutants leads to even better and better life quality. Also, the inexorable technological advancement marching exponentially since the 50s has been cleansing the environment quite spontaneously.

Anyway, the discourse for better health allied with a postmodern romanticist movement that erupted in the 80s to counter the increasing societal complexity, compartmentalization, increasing individualism, and economic sophistication. The focus of the movement was biodiversity and ecological preservation based on an intrinsic priceless value for nature in its own right. The movement bore some semblance to the 19th century romanticism which was a counter reaction against vanishing feudalism and the horrors that ensued the first industrial revolution. The alliance of discourses generated modern environmentalism.

The environmentalist movement gave succour to the neoliberal trend initiated by Thatcher and Reagan aiming for the finacialisation of industrial economies in response to new global economic system limitations. In the 90s, medium- and low-technology industries were relocated to East and south East Asia, the subcontinent, and Lain America.

In the Middle East–as usual– global trends are mimicked blindly without exerting the sufficient intellectual effort needed to extrapolate into the local contexts or to recaliberate organizational settings in order to assimilate global trends in a way responsive to local needs. Environmental agencies were established all over the region; alas, they lacked effective regulation implementation mechanisms, and failed to set up targets aligned with developmental needs. For instance, the agencies could have acted as a conduits for industry and agricultural modernization, along with other tools, while gradually setting practical targets for pollutants concentrations. They could have also developed codes and trends for simple, healthy, and aesthetic architecture for the poor devoid of the fastidious pretensions of eco trends in building.

Now as discussed in previous posts, the future of transport is for clean electrical vehicles, and the prospects of power generation are nuclear fusion, fourth generation fission, and renewables. In other words, localized pollution problems are losing relevance. What is left of environmentalism will be the museum, quasi-spiritual experiences of Argentinian Patagonia, Sub-Saharan jungle preserves which are expected to dramatically decrease in size with the upcoming economic development of Africa, Arab deserts, Northern woods, Brazilian Amazons, North pole, Antarctica, Australian forests, coral reefs areas, and Indian jungle.