Lynton K. Caldwell

Political Aspsects of Ecologically Sustainable Development

In less than two decades, the concepts of limits to growth and of the necessity of an ecologically sustainable economic order have gained international recognition. These concepts are not yet understood by most people or most governments, but belief in the necessity for planning for a sustainable future is growing. Several lines of strategy are necessary to obtain a truly global commitment to sustainable programmes of development that will simultaneously protect The Biosphere. Among those now undertaken are the World Conservation Strategy, the international environmental education movement formalized at Tbilisi in 1977, and the World Campaign for The Biosphere. Educational efforts are necessary but insufficient to move the world into an ecologically sustainable mode of behaviour. Political action that reflects moral conviction roused by scientific information will also be necessary. Safeguarding the environmental future and The Biosphere requires a social commitment of a moral, quasi-religious character.

Globalizing environmentalism: Threshold of a new phase in international relations

Abstract Sociologist Robert Nisbet conjectured that “when the history of the twentieth century is finally written, the single most important social movement of the period will be judged to be environmentalism”; (1982, p. 10). This assessment has been reinforced by subsequent events. Environmental concern has risen to the top of political agendas in the United States and many other countries, becoming a major consideration in international relations. A major force for the globalization of environmental politics in the United States has been the growing international concern of nongovernmental environmental organizations (NGOs). Almost all of the larger environmental NGOs now have significant international programs that attempt to influence public policies. Transnational collaboration between governments and NGOs on environmental issues has become a characteristic of contemporary politics in North America and Western Europe. Global issues such as climate change, ozone depletion, transboundary air and water ...

Energy and the structure of social institutions

The energy crisis is an aspect of the larger approaching crisis of expanding industrial society in a world in which certain critical parameters are finite. This megacrisis involves the role of growth in population, production, consumption, and waste. The insitutions of modern industrial society have been better adapted to promote this growth than to control or direct it. Even in societies where mechanisms of state planning should, in theory, enable government to deal rationally with the growth problem, ideological commitments to general growth have, in effect, prevented the problem from being addressed. In the United States, the pervasive commitment to growth has been built into institutional arrangements to a degree that handicaps efforts to consider the energy problem in its full context. Energy policy therefore tends to be reactive to events rather than the result of a comprehensive long-range assessment of needs and priorities.

Science, Technology, and Public Policy

This course has two major purposes. The first is to foster student awareness of the significance of science and technology as social forces in modern societies, and to develop understanding of the crucial relationships between science, technology, and government. The second major purpose is to provide an overview and introduction to science, technology, and public policy as a field of study, for those students wishing to undertake further work in this area. Consequently, it will be necessary to

Environmental Quality as an Administrative Problem

The basic task of protection and control of environmental quality involves the integration of mans arti ficial and managed systems with the evolved systems of the natural world. Imbalances and incongruities among these systems are the underlying causes of resource depletion, pollution, and qualitative deterioration of the environment. The essential purpose of environmental administration is therefore to obtain a synthesis of artificial and natural systems that will simultaneously serve mans needs and values, and maintain the life-support systems of the biosphere upon which mans welfare and survival ultimately depend. New struc tures and procedures of planning and control appear to be inevitable if contemporary man is to deal effectively with the circumstances that he has himself created. But governmental reorganization cannot safely be undertaken solely with respect to environmental needs. Provision for meeting the environ mental challenge, if it is to be effective, must be made within the context of the broad range of issues and problems confronting contemporary society.

Some problems in the uses of intergovernmental documentation

Abstract Problems encountered in the use of intergovernmental documentation may be roughly classified as those of form (e.g. volume, scope, and diversity), and process (identification and retrieval). Solutions to both sets of problems require informed and collaborative relationships between librarians and researchers for which appropriate institutional and budgetary provision should be made.

Engineering and Ecodevelopment: International Initiatives

Within the past decade, an increasing concern for the quality of the human environment has redirected the emphasis of international development programs. Ecology-conscious development or ecodevelopment has posed new tasks for engineering education and training. International organizations, notably Unesco and UNEP, and regional federations of engineering societies have taken a lead in reorienting engineering education toward a more adequate understanding of the environmental impacts of engineering activities and of ways to reduce harmful effects of engineering upon the environment.