| During the second half of the century there was an increasing awareness of changes in the physical environment caused by industrialization and other aspects of the modern era. This development tended to transform basic economic life and enterprise from seeking to exploit natural resources to seeking to preserve resources being destroyed by the normal activities of modern life. In the years immediately following World War II, concern for environmental preservation was limited. International environmental problems increased nevertheless. Industrial pollution (acid rain) from Germany's Ruhr Valley and the United States' industrial Midwest worsened water quality in Scandinavia and Canada, respectively. Shoreline pollution in major oceans spread beyond national boundaries. The twin sources of growing global pollution were rapid population growth, with attendant increases in human waste, and heightened industrialization (including automobile emissions) both in established industrial nations and in developing newcomers like South Korea, China, Mexico, and Brazil. | 1 |
| A major turning point came in the 1960s when some environmental issues reached crisis levels and events like the publication of Rachel Carson's Silent Spring increased broader public awareness of problems. By the 1960s, serious problems had become apparent in many areas. The dangers of radioactive atmospheric pollution from the extensive testing of nuclear devices first aroused the concerns of popular organizations and then played a role in providing incentives for intergovernmental actions like the Nuclear Test Ban Treaty of 1963. The dangers of extensive use of DDT, even when used for benevolent purposes such as malaria prevention, led to the banning of its use in the United States in 1972. In the second half of the century, voluntary and private organizations played an important role in environmental action. Some were long-established groups, like the Sierra Club in the United States, which had been established in 1892 to encourage wilderness activities and preservation and by the 1960s was a major political activist group. New groups ranged from small, single-issue associations to international activist organizations. Greenpeace was founded in 1969 by a group of Canadians, to take direct nonviolent action against threats to the environment, the hunting of whales and baby seals, and nuclear testing in the Pacific. In 1985 the sinking of Rainbow Warrior, a Greenpeace ship, by French agents in New Zealand caused a major international incident. In Europe, the GREEN MOVEMENT became a visible political force in a number of countries. In the 1980s there were formal Green parties in at least six European countries, and the Green Alliance was an important force in the European Parliament. INTERGOVERNMENTAL ACTIONS also played an increasingly important role. By the 1970s, conferences were held regularly to deal with both specific issues and more general concerns. The UN CONFERENCE ON THE HUMAN ENVIRONMENT (1972) in Stockholm was important in this development. Specific conferences and conventions often created administrative structures to implement international agreements, as was the case with the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species (1973). Other organizations, like the International Whaling Commission, were involved in environmental affairs but represented particular industrial or economic interests. By the 1990s, regular international conferences dealing with environmental issues and involving high-level officials had become an accepted part of international affairs. Limitations on global environmentalism included national sovereignty, resistance by major private companies, and the concern that established industrial powers were trying to impose expensive environmental measures on poorer, developing nations. | 2 |
| Nevertheless, many groups recognized the international dimensions of pollution problems. Conventions and multinational treaties regulating activities ranging from the use of seabed resources to use of outer space became established parts of international law. The UN CONFERENCE ON ENVIRONMENT AND DEVELOPMENT (UNCED), or the Earth Summit, held in Rio de Janeiro in 1992, was a symbol of the globalized environmental context. Leaders of 178 countries attended, making it the largest summit meeting ever held. Representatives and observers from more than 2,000 nongovernmental organizations at the meeting revealed the global scope of private activity as well. Major conventions relating to biodiversity, global warming (including the much-discussed destruction of tropical rain forests), forestry, and environmental policy principles were adopted, and later the UN General Assembly created the Sustainable Development Commission for implementation of the agreements. | 3 |
