Visualizing Environmental Science

56 CHAPTER 3 Environmental History, Politics, and Economics

Day 1970, an estimated 20 million people in the United

States planted trees, cleaned roadsides and riverbanks,

and marched in parades to support improvements in re-

source conservation and environmental quality.

In the years that followed the first Earth Day, environ-

mental awareness and the belief that individual actions

could repair the damage humans were doing to Earth

became a pervasive popular movement. Musicians and

other celebrities popularized environmental concerns.

Many of the world’s r eligions—such as Christianity,

Judaism, Islam, Hinduism, Buddhism, Taoism, Shintoism,

Confucianism, and Jainism— embraced environmental

themes such as protecting endangered species and con-

trolling global climate change.

By Earth Day 1990, the movement had spread around

the world, signaling the rapid growth in environmental

consciousness. An estimated 200 million people in 141

nations demonstrated to increase public awareness of

the importance of individual efforts (“Think globally,

act locally”) (Figure 3.7). The theme of Earth Day 2000,

“Clean Energy Now,” reflected the dangers of global

climate change and what individuals and communities

could do: Replace fossil fuel energy sources with solar

electricity, wind power, and the like. However, by 2000

many environmental activists had begun to think that the

individual actions Earth Day espouses, while collectively

important, are not as important as pressuring governments

and large corporations to make environmentally friendly

decisions. Among the most important people in the

global environmental movement, Wangari Maathai

Todd Gipstein/NG Image Collection

Earth Day 1990 in Washington, DC

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Wangari Maathi was awarded the Noble Peace Prize for her efforts

advancing sustainability in her native Kenya and worldwide.

Christian Boisseaux/La Vie-REA/Redux Pictures

(1940–1911) established the Greenbelt Movement in

Kenya (ˆ}ÕÀiÊΰn). Maathai organized women in rural

areas, showing that they could simultaneously improve

their social, economic, and environmental conditions—

that is, the sustainability of their communities. For her

efforts, Maathai was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize

in 2004. In 2012 global environmental concern was

expressed as thousands of people from around the world

converged on Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, to pressure world

leaders to take action on a variety of global environmental

problems. Figure 3.9 shows a timeline of selected

environmental events since Earth Day 1970.

1. How did public perception of the environment
   evolve during the 20th century?


2. What did Rachel Carson contribute to the
   environmental movement?


3. What distinguishes utilitarian conservationists
   from biocentric preservationists?


4. How can a systems perspective improve
   environmental management?