Forty Years of Environmentalism: Where Do We Go From Here?
By Craig Rosebraugh

Commonly, Earth Day 1970 is regarded as the launching point of the environmental movement. However, it is important to have an understanding of why the 1970 Earth Day came about and the galvanizing forces behind the creation of this new struggle.

 With the industrial revolution occurring in the powerful and wealthier countries during the 1700s and 1800s, a new priority emerged: focusing on large-scale manufacturing and commercialization. No longer was it deemed sensible to take only what one needed from the earth, but rather progress was equated with the ability to stockpile, rampant individualism, the creation and further development of international marketplaces, and the maximization of financial acquisitions and holdings.

While typically it is presumed that the notion of forecasting global warming and climate change are fairly recent phenomenons, philosophers and scientists in the 1800s were already discussing these as potential problems. Victorian natural philosopher, John Tyndall, was one of the first few scientists to acknowledge that layers of ice had at one time covered most of Europe. However, it was Swedish researcher, Svante Arrhenuis, who first described the greenhouse effect in the late 1800s. Arrhenius conducted research to demonstrate that if levels of CO2 were reduced in the atmosphere, the temperature in Europe could be lowered by 3 to 4 degrees Celsius.

Another scientist at the time, Arvid Hogbom, actually calculated the amount of CO2 emitted by humans and discovered that it was roughly equivalent to the amount of CO2 created by the natural geochemical process.

In 1938, an English engineer by the name of Guy Stewart Callendar stated that if CO2 levels were doubled, this could lead to a 2 degree Celsius increase in temperature in coming centuries.
The post-World War II period saw a rise in industrial pollution and individuals began to increasingly notice the visibility of air and water pollution. In 1962, Rachel Carson published the now famous book, Silent Spring, which warned of pesticide’s detrimental effects on nature, particularly on birds. In 1965, Ralph Nader published, Unsafe at Any Speed, which in Chapter 4 discussed the automobile’s impact on air pollution and its contribution to smog.

Then in 1968, a set of images added significantly to the growing concern for the environment. For the first time, Apollo 8’s mission to the moon that year showed images of the Earth, which highlighted both its interconnectedness and its fragility.

In 1969, while the War was raging in Vietnam and anti-war activity was abundant in the U.S., the Cuyahoga River in Cleveland, Ohio burst into flames from pollution. Occurring in what was described as “the river that oozes not flows,” this was only one of thirteen documented fires on the river caused from pollution since the 1800s. The same year, a blow-out on a Union Oil platform six miles offshore of Santa Barbara, California, caused upward of 100,000 barrels of crude oil to spill into the channel and onto the beaches of Santa Barbara. An estimated 10,000 birds were killed in the spill.

These precursors, combined with the U.S. Interior Department’s proposal to flood the Grand Canyon in the 1960s, the Torry Canyon oil tanker running aground off the coast of England, mercury poisoning in Japan, and the influence of other recent and occurring social and political movements, spurred a new movement that commenced in the 1970s with the first Earth Day on April 22nd.

The growing concern toward environmental protection in the United States was mirrored at the international level. Sweden initiated the original call for an international conference on the environment to be held in Stockholm in 1972.  Six months before the conference was to take place, developing countries passed a resolution in the U.N. General Assembly stressing that escalating concerns for the environment should not undermine their economic objectives.

This was truly the beginning of the North/South divide over the environment that was echoed as recently as the Copenhagen Summit this past December. The 1972 U.N. resolution grew out of a concern by the southern developing nations that this new environmental focus was predominantly a campaign pushed by the post-industrialized nations onto the south – one that would dramatically impact the ability of the developing nations to develop their economies. Resulting from this concern, the G77 developing nations stressed an agenda at Stockholm highlighting issues of poverty and economic development.

The United Nations Conference on the Human Environment was held in Stockholm from June 5 to June 16, 1972 and in attendance were representatives from 113 countries, from international non-governmental organizations, and other agencies. This first U.N. conference on the environment acknowledged that environmental protection would require international cooperation. Three major results came from Stockholm. First, under the Stockholm Declaration, participating countries agreed on twenty-six principles that highlighted a new ethic to govern the future behavior of societies towards the environment. Second, the Stockholm Action Plan was created which consisted of 109 policy recommendations in six areas: human settlements, natural resource management, pollutants, environment and development, the social context underlying environmental issues, and international organizational behavior. Third, the conference created the United Nations Environment Program. The envisioned tasks of the UNEP were to develop environmental information and assessment programs, exchange and disseminate data on the seriousness of particular problems, and further international cooperation toward solutions for shared environmental problems. The headquarters for the UNEP was strategically placed in Nairobi, Kenya, to provide further support and legitimacy for the project amongst developing nations.

After the Stockholm conference, international awareness of environmental concerns increased along with drives to link environmental protection with sustainable development. In 1979, the Convention on Long-Range Transboundary Air Pollution was created to address major air pollution problems in the regions of Eastern Europe, Central Asia and Southeast Europe. An ill-fated follow-up conference, Stockholm Plus Ten, was held in Nairobi in 1982, which failed to make significant strides forward in terms of enacted policies or even green lip service.

After the Nairobi conference, the Vienna Convention for the Protection of the Ozone layer was held in 1985 and attended by 43 nations. It produced the first international agreement to address CFCs and called on countries to take appropriate measures to protect the ozone layer. It additionally established an international mechanism for research, monitoring and exchange of information.

Following in the footstep of the Vienna Convention, the Montreal Protocol entered into force on January 1, 1989. Its purpose was to protect the ozone layer from ozone-depleting substances, including CFCs and HCFCs. A total of 196 countries have ratified both the Vienna Convention and the Montreal Protocol and the overwhelming majority of these have also ratified the various Amendments to the Protocol in London, Copenhagen, Montreal, and Beijing.

While the Vienna Convention and Montreal Protocol were considered minor successes, the next step for the UN was another convergence on the twentieth anniversary of Stockholm which would make significant strides towards environmental protection.

The United Nations Conference on Environment and Development was held in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, from June 2 to June 14, 1992. Government officials from 178 countries participated along with thousands of representatives from NGOs and the media. Focusing on the previous twenty years since Stockholm, the Conference – which became known as the Earth Summit – addressed the question of how to protect the environment through the implementation of sustainable development. Owing to the fact that the Cold War had ended and there was a growing international concern for the environment, the Earth Summit was able to take further steps than those walked in Stockholm.

There were a number of important results that came out of the Rio summit. First, the Rio Declaration created a set of guiding principles between the north and south on the relationship between environment and development. Though the principles were non-binding, they were seen as a successful measure resulting from the agreed upon linkage between environmental protection and sustainable development.

Second, the Earth Summit produced the Agenda 21, a blueprint for putting sustainable development into practice. There were four main areas of Agenda 21: social and economic development, conservation and management of resources for development, strengthening the role of major groups, and the means of implementation. The Commission on Sustainable Development was created to monitor the implementation of Agenda 21.

Third, the conference created the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC). Under the banner of the UNFCCC, nations agreed that protecting the climate was a common concern to humans and established the goal of preventing dangerous anthropogenic interference with the global climate system. The Convention divides nations into two groups: those listed in Annex 1 of the Convention and those who are non-Annex parties. Annex 1 parties are the industrialized countries who have historically contributed most to the problem of climate change. The UNFCCC called on Annex 1 nations to stabilize their greenhouse gas emissions at 1990 levels by the year 2000.

Fourth, the Conference created the United Nations Convention on Biological Diversity to conserve biological species, genetic resources, habitats, and ecosystems. It further sought to ensure the sustainable use of biological materials and to guarantee the fair and equitable sharing of benefits derived from genetic resources. A significant purpose behind the convention was to assist in making the principles of Agenda 21 a reality.

Lastly, the Rio summit confirmed the implementation of the Global Environment Facility (GEF). The GEF was established to assist in financing global environmental objectives.

In the years following the Rio Earth Summit, there were a number of intermittent advancements leading up to the 1997 Kyoto Protocol. These included the U.N. Convention to Combat Desertification, the Rotterdam Convention (pertaining to trade in chemicals and pesticides), the Stockholm Convention on Persistent Organic Pollutants, and the Cartagena Protocol on Biosafety (dealing with genetically modified organisms).

The first addition to the UNFCCC treaty was the Kyoto Protocol adopted in 1997. Under Kyoto, 37 industrialized nations and the European Community agreed to reduce emissions by 5 percent of 1990 levels by 2012. Two notable exclusions to the Protocol were the United States and Australia, who both refused to sign. To date, 184 parties have signed onto the Kyoto Protocol, which entered into force on February 16, 2005. While the UNFCCC encouraged developed nations to reduce greenhouse gas emissions, the Kyoto Protocol commits them to such changes.

In 2002, the World Summit for Sustainable Development was held in Johannesburg. This conference was specifically geared towards the implementation of the Agenda 21. Unfortunately, due to a combination of factors – the September 11, 2001 attacks in the United States and poor leadership within the conference – Johannesburg did not accomplish much. The agreements reached included: endorsing the 2000 Millennium Goal aimed at cutting in half the proportion of the world’s people lacking access to basic sanitation by 2015; and minimizing adverse effects of toxic chemicals by 2020.

With the Kyoto Protocol set to expire in 2012, the Copenhagen summit was held last December as a last attempt to broker an international climate deal to follow up Kyoto. In the months leading up to Copenhagen, countries representing three distinct categories were at odds over two primary areas: emissions reductions and assistance. In years past the world had been categorized into two groups – the post industrialized countries and the developing nations.  Now a third grouping needs to be recognized: the emerging economies of nations such as China, India, South Africa and Brazil. The industrialized nations were unwilling to meet the demands for emissions reductions set by international scientific consensus – a reduction of greenhouse gas emissions 25-40 percent of levels in 1990 by the year 2020 – while simultaneously refusing to provide adequate financial assistance and transfer of technology required by developing nations to make the adjustments.

The walk-out of the G77 representatives during the second week of the summit illustrated the political inadequacy and the lack of will by nations to place climate change prevention as a top priority. In the end, a back door deal created by the U.S., China, India, Brazil, South Africa, and other major European countries prevailed amongst many protests from developing nations, which were arguing that the process was undemocratic and the Accord toothless. Owing to the fact that the UNFCCC process requires consensus decision making, the Copenhagen Accord was not officially sanctioned by the U.N. since it failed to win the support of a number of countries.

In the end, the Copenhagen Accord consisted of only two major points: 1) it provided a commitment to limit global warming by 2 degrees Celsius (while unfortunately not providing any targets or stepping stones to accomplish this feat), and 2) set a “fast-track” funding allocation of $30 billion in financial aid from wealthier countries to developing nations, and a goal of jointly mobilizing $100 billion in aid by 2020. Further talks on the Copenhagen Accord are scheduled for December 2010 in Cancun, Mexico.

The major problems consistent with all of these international agreements is that they lack enforcement mechanisms and the agreed-upon principles are typically far below the adequacy levels of what is required as decided by a vast majority of top climate scientific bodies. Typically, if a convention or treaty attempts to implement serious binding changes, the powerful and wealthy countries will refuse to sign on. So to have significant support and a rate of ratification, these agreements become watered down to a state of greenwashing lip service.

So the question then once again must be asked, how do we as humans on planet Earth in this international community of global environmental problems make a difference? Will the changes that the planet requires come from the international political realm and bodies, such as the U.N. and UNFCCC, which attempt to multilaterally align nations to commit to environmental protection? Will they come from individual nations making changes through domestic law, voluntarily placing restrictions on industry-related emissions? Will they come, as some theorists suggest, through the investment into a green market, whereby we allow a new competition-driven international economy to regulate climate change? Will they come from a revised version of the current cap and trade system? Will they come from the international or national NGOs, lobbying efforts, public education and lawsuits? Will they come from individuals taking illegal direct action? Will they come from individuals protesting, speaking out, and reducing our own carbon footprints?

These are the questions that each and every one of us must ask ourselves in order to move forward and progress this movement toward any conceivable chance of success. It is clear that all of our activities on the personal level, domestic level among international nation-states, and international level overall have been unsuccessful in preventing climate change. As we reflect on this fact on the 40th anniversary of the beginnings of the modern environmental movement, it is time that we come to some concrete and workable solutions. To continue to engage in activity that is self-defeating, that is mentally and physically harmful and counterproductive is pathological. We cannot rely on strategies and tactics that have been previously employed because they have not worked. In order to move forward and stand any possibility of reversing the trend of global climate change we need to first, identify and understand the problem and its sources and second, to create a sound strategy with implemented development goals catered specifically to addressing the identified issues. In short we need a plan – and relying on what has been done before is insufficient.