Environmental Management: Principles and practice

The Green Movement
The Green Movement is a social or cultural movement, of considerable diversity,
that shares a common environmental concern and which often embarks on political
action, mainly of a reformist or radical nature. ‘Green’ roughly means
‘environmentally friendly’; ‘greening’ roughly means ‘environmental improvement’.
Reich (1970), writing about the possibilities for a new development ethic after the
demise of the corporate state, was probably first to use ‘greening’. The use of green
terminology increased after the mid-1980s in politics and as a popular alternative to
‘environment’, soon becoming common in media discussions.
There is little about green philosophy which is new (Hill, 1972; Weston, 1986).
Although ‘green’ often implies politicized environmentalism, many groups are not
politically active, and indeed eschew politics. Greens are essentially mounting a
cultural attack on the ills of modern society and economics, a sort of parallel to the
economic attack by socialists (Redclift, 1984; Adams, 1990:71). What would probably
have been called Gandhian in the mid-1970s is now likely to be called green. Greens
may be socialists, conservatives, intellectuals, poor people, Bhuddists, Christians,
Muslims, or humanists. Most share a fear that industrial nations are pursuing an
unsustainable, dangerous development path (Porritt, 1984:15). North (1995:3) noted
that greens often overlook the fact that they are the ‘flowering of a science-based
industrial society’, and that unreasoning opposition to scientific progress, business
and so on may not achieve useful environmental progress.
Greens can be roughly subdivided into: romantic, anarchistic and utopian; or
simply into ‘light’ or ‘dark’ greens. They may be said to have grown from partially
American roots and draw upon the writings of Henry Thoreau, Theodor Roszak,
Ivan Illich, Aldo Leopold, Martin Luther King and others (Roszak, 1979; Spretnak
and Capra, 1985:xvii; Devall and Sessions, 1985) (see Box 8.2).
The Green Movement has tended to develop a schism between light-green (or
shallow) and deep-green (or deep) ecology. The division was largely initiated by the
Norwegian philosopher Arne Naess (Naess, 1973; 1988; 1989). It might be more
accurate to talk of deep and shallow ecologies, as there is a wide spectrum of
interpretation of what ‘ecology’ means.
Deep ecology seeks to replace the existing social, political and economic status
quo with new environmentally appropriate bioethics and supportive politics.
Supporters blame many environmental problems on the anthropocentric nature of

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modern development, and adopt a biocentric (ecocentric) outlook, granting all life
(human and non-human) intrinsic value (Evernden, 1985; Grey, 1986; Devall, 1988;
Sessions, 1994). In general, deep ecology is synonymous with radical ecology and
extends beyond the approach proposed by Naess, to include perspectives like social
ecology and eco-feminism, and some incorporate Taoist or Gandhian philosophy. It
can be argued that deep ecology gives non-scientific input similar to (if not greater
than) the importance scientific, and in some cases may be hostile to science. This
rejection of science may well prove a serious barrier to effective environmental
management. One of the most radical groups of deep ecologists, Earth First!, is
prepared to use violence to support its environmentalism—‘monkeywrenching’ or
‘ecotaging’ (ecological sabotage) if need be (Abbey, 1975).
Shallow ecology seeks to apply ecological principles to ensure better
management and control of the environment for human benefit—i.e. it is
anthropocentric (Jacob, 1994). There is far less of the rejection of established science
characteristic of most deep ecologists. Shallow ecology is more inclined to try to
work with existing economics and ethics (Fox, 1984; 1995); it is more likely to be
concerned with solutions than efforts to avoid problems in the first place.
Social ecology was largely initiated (in the USA) by the anarcho-socialist
Murray Bookchin, who was critical of deep ecology (Bookchin, 1980; 1990). In
some camps it is seen as separate from deep ecology; others view it as an offshoot.
Social ecology supporters see environmental problems as basically the result of social
problems, and adopt an anthropocentric, decentralized, co-operative approach—a
sort of eco-anarchy (Devall and Sessions, 1985; Tokar, 1988; Devall, 1991). The
main difference from mainstream deep ecology is that social ecology is humanist
rather than ecocentric.
If decisions have to be made to protect the environment without adequate proof,
deep ecologists are more likely to give support because they require no obvious
human advantage. Jacob (1994) explores the potential of deep and shallow ecology
as routes to sustainable development. It seems unlikely that either extreme—deep or
shallow—alone can effectively serve environmental management. Indeed, they form
a continuum and so some sort of blend of both their ethics and approaches is required
(Norton, 1991; Jacob, 1994). However, environmental management must also make
use of science.