Although Rachel Carson’s 1962 seminal study, Silent Spring, is credited with launching the modern environment-conscious movement in the United States, conservation issues have been part of the national landscape since the late 19th century. Carson’s inquiry, which gave scientific evidence that supported findings of unhealthy levels of toxins in our bodies and in our environment, provided the stimulus for the environmental movement that coalesced in the late 1960s.
The modern environmental movement is distinguished from earlier activity by its foundation in rigorous science. The German biologist Ernst Haeckel coined the term “ecology” (a branch of science concerned with the interrelationship of organisms and their environments) in 1866; nearly a century later, the designation was still virtually unknown to those outside the field of biology. Silent Spring, in conjunction with the increasing viability of this unique field of study, helped foster a new approach to the role of scientific inquiry in the United States. Science had increasingly been regarded as a handmaiden to industrial capitalism; environmental science contradicted this view. Ecology identified the various ways that human interaction with nature and the environment had been both dangerous and disruptive and, by the 1970s, provided a scientific foundation for environmental advocacy.
Biologist Barry Commoner, author of The Closing Circle: Nature, Man and Technology (1971), conjoined scientific study with social justice issues, and called for ecology to bring environmental equity to Western society through radical economic, social, and political changes. Commoner’s maxims “Nature Knows Best,” “Everything Must Go Somewhere,” “There Is No Such Thing as a Free Lunch,” and “Everything Is Connected to Everything Else,” rapidly entered public discourse.
Environmental concerns were widespread in America by the early 1970s. This awareness was brought sharply into focus by the celebration of the first Earth Day on March 21, 1970. Wisconsin senator Gaylord Nelson conceived the event and enlisted others, who linked the celebration to antiwar and civil rights issues. American endorsement of Earth Day signified that the general population was conscious of their national and global environment, as well as showing concern about conserving natural resources. Earth Day proved to be a seminal event in the contemporary environmental movement.
In 1972 the Club of Rome, a private international group of scientists, issued The Limits to Growth. Although primitive in comparison to later computer models, this study analyzed the effect of long-term uncontrolled population growth, industrial output, and resource consumption, and how they affected pollution and food supplies. Their results predicted a neo-Malthusian global failure, and the collapse of humanity by the early 21st century.
Nature and conservation groups like the Sierra Club, the Wilderness Society, the National Wildlife Federation, and the Nature Conservancy have existed since 1892, but in the 1970s new organizations emerged to participate in the environmental movement, including the League of Conservation Voters, Natural Resources Defense Council, Friends of the Earth, and others. The focus of these and other new nongovernmental organizations (NGOs) encompassed a range of issues including protection of the environment, conservation of natural resources and wildlife, as well as such other issues as energy efficiency, nuclear winter, global warming, population growth, and pollution control. Also in the 1970s, new public interest research groups (PIRGs), concerned with a range of issues including some environmental issues, emerged to force public disclosure and government action against air pollution, toxic dumps, nuclear waste, and contaminated water supplies. Environmentalism was professionalized during the 1970s, but amateurs continued to play a dominant role in the movement. As with other movements during this era, environmentalism also found radical adherents, who came together in Greenpeace and the Earth First! Movement. The more extreme environmentalists utilized sit-ins, demonstrations, and occasionally espoused “eco-tage,” the destruction of power lines, logging equipment, and the occasional ski lodge.
The federal government responded to public desire for greater conservation and environmental involvement, passing the Wilderness Act in 1964, which facilitated the creation of roadless, protected regions. A series of wildlife protection legislation was passed in 1968, 1971, and 1973: respectively, the Wild and Scenic Rivers Act, the Wild Free-Roaming Horse and Burro Act, and the Endangered Species Act. The latter has proved to be a source of contention between those seeking to preserve animals like the snail darter fish and spotted owl, and fishing and logging interests.
The National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA) is the foundation for contemporary environmental policies. It was signed into law by President Richard M. Nixon on January 1, 1970, in response to polls that showed strong mainstream support for federal protection of the environment. NEPA’s mandate required all federal agencies to protect the environment. To facilitate this, the Council on Environmental Quality (CEQ) was created. By the end of 1970, the CEQ proposed the formation of a separate agency, the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), in order to evaluate solid waste, air, and water pollution as different types of the same problem. The EPA was created that year as an independent agency. In 2000, the agency had an operating budget of $6.7 billion and a workforce of 18,000.
During the course of the 1970s, important environmental legislation was enacted, including the Clean Air Act of 1970, the Occupational Safety and Health Act (1970), the Water Pollution Control Act (1972), the Safe Drinking Water Act (1974), and the Comprehensive Environmental Response Compensation and Liability Act (1980). The result of these and other mandates was the addition of millions of acres to the federal wilderness system, the requirement of environmental impact assessments on major construction projects, and the cleaning up of American lakes and streams
Workers clean up part of a waste oil spill on the Rouge River, Michigan. (Bill Pugliano/Cetty Images)
One important legislative act dealing with land-based hazardous waste was the Resource Conservation and Recovery Act of 1976. Prior to this act, hazardous waste was stored in pits, ponds, or slag piles, or shipped to undisclosed sites. Following the discovery of toxic dumps in places like “Love Canal,” in Niagara Falls, New York, public pressure encouraged federal regulation to control treatment, generation, transportation, and destruction of hazardous materials. The Superfund, initiated by Congress in 1980 in response to Love Canal, was mandated to identify and clean up hazardous wastes. Within a decade of its inception, the Superfund was sharply criticized as being incredibly slow and inefficient. Although some 1,250 sites around the country have been identified, only 180 had been cleaned up, at a cost of some $6.7 billion.
Concerns about the environment spurred many new efforts to reduce pollution and waste in the United States by policy makers and activists in the 1990s. During the 20th anniversary of Earth Day on April 20, 1990, thousands of Americans assembled in major cities across the nation to listen to speeches and rock concerts designed to promote environmental awareness. As Americans became more cognizant of environmentalism, larger educational programs emerged to promote such principles. One such example was the launch of a massive conservation campaign titled, “Reduce, Reuse, and Recycle.” Public and private schools adopted this program to educate children about environmentalism and provided recycling bins for many classrooms. In some cases, educators integrated environmentalism into science curriculum by having their students test rainwater for acid and evaluate the health of soil. Educational television programs also became an integral part of this awareness campaign. Perhaps the most popular children’s program was Cap-tain Planet and the Planeteers (1990-93), which featured five teenagers and an environmental superhero who were charged with protecting the planet. With interest and concern at a peak, policy makers responded to this interest in environmentalism by making amendments to the Clean Air Act in 1990. The new amendments included stringent guidelines to limit the amount of pollutants into the air, introduced a permit program to monitor pollutant producers, and provided standards for automakers to limit vehicle emissions. By the end of the 1990s, recycling programs, educational materials, the media, and policy makers clearly had an effect on American society. In 1998 alone, almost 45 million tons of paper had been recovered; the EPA reported that air pollution declined by almost 40 percent; and in 1999 more than 50 percent of Americans considered themselves environmentalists in a poll conducted by Gallup.
In 2002 Americans spent more than $124 billion per year to facilitate federal environmental statutes and regulations. In an effort to curb these expenditures, reformers offer three possibilities to revise current environmental policy. The first advocates direct government regulation of all activities affecting the environment. The second relies on federal guidance to shape environmental policy but market-based incentives to implement it. The third suggests that with a properly contrived plan of property rights, augmented by contract and tort law, market forces could take care of the environment without the need for government interference.
Despite the three varying opinions on environmental policy, arriving at such a solution since 2002 has evaded policy makers because of intense partisanship over the long-term effects of and how to implement environmental policy. Much of this debate has stemmed from finding an energy policy that is eco-friendly and concerns over global warming and how regulation would affect the nation’s economy. America’s energy policy has been a frequent issue among legislators. In 2002 President George W. Bush, citing a lack of oil supplies in the nation, proposed drilling in Alaska’s arctic wilderness. His proposal was blocked in the Senate in 2002, but the president continued to lobby for its approval in subsequent years. In that same year, to address concerns about global warming, President Bush proposed the Clear Skies Initiative to reduce sulfur, nitrogen oxide, and mercury emissions in the air. Concerns between Democrats and Republicans over the actual application of the bill and whether it would actually reduce emissions in the United States resulted in its defeat in committee. In another attempt to reduce air emissions to stop global warming, Senator John McCain (R-Ariz.) and Senator Joseph Lieberman (I-Conn.) proposed a bill in 2003 and 2005. The bill failed both times.
Since 2005, however, amid rising concerns over global warming, Congress has significantly shifted its focus to environmental policy. In the summer of 2005, in an effort to reduce harmful emissions, Congress passed the Energy Policy Act, which provided tax breaks for companies seeking forms of energy other than crude oil. In later years, Congress remained devoted to instituting a sound energy policy, provided larger government subsidies to protect America’s wetlands, stopped government subsidies for loggers in Alaska’s Tongass rain forest, and investigated global warming through special committees. Global warming became a higher priority for policy makers after the release of Vice
President Albert Gore’s documentary, An Inconvenient Truth, which won an Academy Award and a Nobel Peace Prize for Gore for his devotion to environmental causes.
Issues of how to best protect the environment while maintaining a healthy economy, although not necessarily incompatible goals, have given rise to political and policy debates at the local, state, and national levels, through third-party political organizations and major political parties. Many activists have turned to the Green Party as a means of focusing the nation’s attention on environmental issues. The debate over drilling for oil resources in the arctic wilderness in Alaska, blocked in the Senate in 2002 over President George W. Bush’s wishes, illustrates that debate over the environment and maintaining the nation’s energy supplies will continue into the future. President Barack Hussein Obama has called for increased investment in renewable—and, thus, environmentally friendly, or “green”—energy sources such as solar and wind power, while also taxing and capping greenhouse gas emissions from traditional energy sources such as oil and coal. Obama argues that the threat of climate change and U. S. independence from foreign oil can be countered with green technology, but his critics argue that the strategy will unfairly penalize businesses and big industry.
See also economy; energy; population trends; science and technology.
Further reading: Frances Cairncross, Costing the Earth: The Challenge for Governments, Opportunities for Business (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard Business School Press, 1991); Mark Dowie, Losing Ground (Boston: MIT Press, 1995); Al Gore, Earth in the Balance: Ecology and the Human Spirit (New York: Dutton, 1992); Robert Gottlieb, Forcing the Spring (Washington, D. C.: Island Press, 1993); Paul Milazzo, Unlikely Environmentalists: Congress and Clean Water, 1945-1972 (Lawrence: University Press of Kansas, 2006).
—Michele Rutledge and Matthew C. Sherman
World History
