February 09, 2005

"Environmentalism" is dead

The assertion that "environmentalism is dead" rocked me back for an instant, but I see the authors' point. (Registration required, or use Bugmenot.com.)

Their paper asserts that the movement's senior leadership was blinded by its early successes and has become short-sighted and "just another special interest." Its gloomy warnings and geeky, technocentric policy prescriptions are profoundly out of step with the electorate, Mr. Shellenberger and Mr. Nordhaus say.

"We have become convinced that modern environmentalism, with all of its unexamined assumptions, outdated concepts and exhausted strategies, must die so that something new can live," they wrote. As proof, they cite the debate on global warming and the largely unsuccessful push for federal regulation of industrial and automobile emissions.

They avoided making tactical prescriptions, but they did chide the movement for its limited efforts to find common ground with other groups, like labor and urged their compatriots to tap into the country's optimism.


Yup. Rants and jeremiads will get you only so far. Look at my other post for today; there is plenty of, um, energy to be tapped into.

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