What Then Shall We Do

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What Then Shall We Do ?
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Outline

• Environmental Education
• Environmental Careers
• Individual Accountability
• Green Consumerism
• Collective Actions
• Environmental Groups
• Mainline
• Radical
• Green Politics

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Environmental Education

• In 1990 Congress passed the National Education
  Act establishing two goals
• Improve understanding among general public of the
  natural and built environment and the
  relationships between humans and their
  environment.
• To encourage post-secondary students to pursue
  careers related to the environment.

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Environmental Literacy

• William Reilly, former EPA administrator, called
  for environmental literacy in which every citizen
  is fluent in the principles of ecology and has a
  working knowledge of the environment.
• Foster a stewardship ethic.

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Citizen Science

• Ordinary people join with established scientists
  to answer real scientific questions.
• Audubon Christmas Bird Count

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Environmental Careers

• Trained people in environmental professions at
  every level from support staff to managers to
  educators are essential, and those roles will
  only increase in importance.
• U.S. federal government alone projects hiring
  10,000 people a year in environmental disciplines.

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INDIVIDUAL ACCOUNTABILITY

• How much is enough ?
• Average American now consumes twice as many goods
  and services as in 1950.
• Average house is now more than twice as big as 50
  years ago, even though the typical family has
  half the number of people.

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How Much Is Enough ?

• Growing number of people find themselves stuck in
  a vicious cycle
• Work frantically at a job they hate, to buy
  things they dont need, so they can save time to
  work longer hours.

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Lohas and Cultural Creatives

• Lohas - Lifestyles of health and sustainability.
• Represent 230 billion annually.
• Cultural Creatives - Group of socially conscious
  people involved in improving communities, and
  willing to translate values into action.
• Paul Ray and Sherry Ruth Anderson.

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Green Consumerism

• As consumers demand environmentally friendly
  products, manufacturers, food producers, and
  merchants are moving to safer, more humane, and
  more sustainable consumer items.

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Confusing Choices

• Many terms used in advertising are vague and have
  little meaning
• Nontoxic
• Biodegradable
• Natural
• Organic
• Environmentally Friendly

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Limits of Green Consumerism

• Often, consumers are faced with complicated
  comparisons and choices.
• Paper or Plastic grocery bags ?
• Both have good and bad points, and represent
  trade-offs.
• Recycling
• Energy Use
• Pollution Production

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Limits of Green Consumerism

• Green consumerism generally can do little about
  larger issues of global equality, chronic
  poverty, and oppression in the Third World.
• Danger that exclusive focus on small problems may
  divert attention from greater needs.

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COLLECTIVE ACTIONS

• Student Environmental Groups
• Elementary and Secondary Schools
• Kids Saving the Earth
• Eco-Kids Corp
• College
• Student Environmental Action Coalition

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Mainline Environmental Groups

• National Wildlife Federation
• World Wildlife Fund
• Audubon Society
• Sierra Club
• Izaak Walton League
• Friends of the Earth
• Greenpeace
• Ducks Unlimited
• Wilderness Society

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Mainline Environmental Groups

• Mass membership, large professional staffs, and
  long history provide these groups a degree of
  respectability and influence not found in newer,
  smaller groups.
• Mainline environmental organizations are often
  criticized by radical environmentalists for their
  tendency to compromise and cooperate with the
  establishment.

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Broadening the Environmental Agenda

• Environmental movement in the U.S. tends to be
  overwhelmingly white, middle-class, and suburban.
• Another critical problem is determining whether
  it is better to overturn society to explore new
  ways of living, or to work for progressive change
  within existing political, economic, and social
  systems.

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Radical Environmental Groups

• Direct Action Groups
• Earth First!
• Sea Shepherd
• Strongest concerns of these militant activists
  tend to be animal rights and protection of wild
  nature.
• Main tactics are civil disobedience and
  attention-grabbing actions.
• Monkey Wrenching

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Wise Use Movement

• About one-quarter of Americans are strongly
  pro-environment, while an equal number believe in
  preserving conventional social roles and cultural
  values.
• Drawing on anger and resentment felt by many
  traditionalists, a number of Wise Use groups have
  formed.
• Advocate resource conservation rather than
  preservation.

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Sustainability

• Sustainable Development
• Developing countries need access to
  more-efficient, less-polluting technologies.
• Technology Transfer
• Financial Aid
• Need to find compromise between no-growth and
  unlimited growth.

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International Nongovernmental Organizations

• Citizen groups working for social change.
• May be highly visible, or work behind the scenes.
• May be professional, or grass-roots.
• Public education and consciousness- raising
  activities are generally important tactics.

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GREEN POLITICS

• Environmental Citizenship
• What are the duties of a citizen ?
• Green Politics
• Growing political concerns and movements
• What Can an individual do ?
• Multiple roles
• Earth Charter
• Principles of environmental protection and
  sustainable development.

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Summary

• Environmental Education
• Environmental Careers
• Individual Accountability
• Green Consumerism
• Collective Actions
• Environmental Groups
• Mainline
• Radical
• Green Politics

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