It's Not the Planet that's the Problem. It's Us

Abstract

Twenty years ago, there was a rising anxiety about the increase in population, the loss of soils and clean waters and clean air, the future of the earth. The Stockholm Conference on the Environment in 1972 was an attempt to address these problems and get.people to recognize them. Then the military-industrial powers moved in, strangling debate, rubbishing the problems, suborning the media and pushing the unwelcome facts underground. Now, we have another rising roar of anxiety; the ozone belt, the greenhouse effect, the loss of soils, the exponential rise in populations, are back on the agenda of politicians and the subject of articles and talks and letters and talk-back shows. But we haven't changed our own priorities, or given our governments and and public servants a new and urgent agenda. And we haven't changed our attitudes.