There is no doubt that an increasing disharmony
between man and nature is apparent, especially in phenomena such as
malnutrition, soil erosion, gross pollution, and the attrition of
the aesthetic qualities of parts of the environment which have
cross- cultural value. One of the major concerns is that the
increasing magnitude of human resource processes is creating a set
of environmental problems, which in turn may impair not only the
usefulness of the environment, but also its life- supporting
capability, its ability to absorb wastes and its beauty.
The environmental problems created by more people
using more materials can be divided into those with an
environmental linkage, and those with a largely social linkage with
the quality of family life and economic opportunity. The former
group in turn comprises regional problems such as sewage, sulphur
dioxide fallout, the habitat requirements of migratory birds, or
particular geographical entities such as the world's major rivers
and the uses made of them.
Much stronger anxiety, however, has been
expressed about global problems such as food supply and the
consequences of agricultural intensification, residual pesticides,
the effects of the contamination of the oceans by oil, and the
alteration of atmospheric processes by increased loads of carbon
dioxide with a theoretical outcome of global warming.
The first of these is the argument that
technological development will eventually provide solutions; the
second, by contrast, advocates a radically different approach to
the relations of man and nature. These two views have been endorsed
by world leaders attending a series of environmental summits
beginning in the 1970s. Strategies have been agreed where the
solutions reside in applications of science to environmental
management in the context of conservation as the practical response
to a growing ecological conscience.
In the end, the greatest challenge will not be
technological or even economic. As University of Maryland economist
Herman Daly has written, a sustainable economy
"would
make fewer demands on our environmental resources, but much greater
demands on our moral resources."
One of those demands will be to reorganize
international institutions so that power is based not on who has
the biggest GNP but on ahuman sense of fairness, balance—and
what is ultimately needed to ensure a healthy future for humanity
and the planet. This may seem like a big leap in the first few
years of the new century. But as we begin to look back on the last
century that began with women prohibited from voting in most
countries, and with war viewed as the accepted means of settling
differences among major powers, we should set a high standard for
the decades ahead.