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TODAY Wednesday 22 October 1997 Each weekday. Conn Nugent on what's new in the world, on the site.

 

TODAY IN THE WORLD: Markets and Medium-Greens

Yesterday we ventured to Washington for the announcement of our plan (with Second Nature) to present The Green Apple Awards to the nation's best environmental educators. To add local flavor, we marked the occasion with a panel discussion among four political analysts.

The panel was entitled "Changes in Environmental Policy: What's Needed for the 21st Century." We asked the panelists to touch on two big questions. What changes in public policy, if any, would best protect public health from environmental contamination? What changes in public policy would best retard the depletion of ecosystems and natural resources? In order to foment extensive, nuanced discussions-in-depth, we limited each speaker to five minutes. No one stayed under five minutes but no one went more than ten.

Deb Callahan, President of the League of Conservation Voters, led off by saying that environmentalism in the 21st Century would have to deal with ecological sustainability as a reality, not a slogan. And the reality will be complex, pervasive, and global. "We don't exist in a box." Take global warming as an example. Scientifically, the debate is settled. Now the challenge is to come up with an international response that is "sensible, workable, yet adequate." And coming up with such a response requires an unprecedented degree of inter-disciplinariness: science, engineering, economics, planning, community development. Key to almost all successes will be an active and positive business sector that sees "opportunities, not obstacles," particularly in the development and sales of benign technologies. The 21st Century will need both environmental regulations for problems that the market can't handle and profit incentives for those that it can.

Then we heard from Fred Smith of the Competitive Enterprise Institute. He described Deb Callahan's analysis as a typical "Medium Green" view, essentially market socialist. It's a reworking of an old paradigm: markets fail to consider environmental damages and remedies, so political intervention is critical. But why believe that an approach that gave us the fiasco of central economic planning will work when it's central ecological planning? Government-centered approaches "infringe liberties, decrease efficiencies, and are unfair to those left out." The hope for the 21st Century is to concentrate not on politics but on institutions, most important of which is the institution of private property. "Man is a problem solver," and his ingenuity is best unleashed when he has a personal interest in the outcome. For a recent example, look what happened to the so-called oil shortage. As to global warming, there was no consensus on the science. If it is happening, positive as well as negative things will occur. And the negative things will be best handled by "smarter, wealthier" people who actually own natural resources.

Gene Ulm of Public Opinion Strategies thought it would be useful to talk about American public opinion on the environment. It's a mistake to assert confidently that "the public" wants this or that environmental policy. "There are many publics speaking with many minds." There can be huge movements of public opinion about the importance of the environment, depending on what other values it is juxtaposed against. Two core facts can be asserted, though: 1) people now believe that nature is finite and can be damaged or lost; and 2) people also believe that we can have a safe environment and profitable industries at the same time, and they don't like to hear anyone say we can't. Another increasingly important factor is the growing tendency for people to want to know the source of information before they judge its validity. "Who said that? Some hired gun?" What does "science" say,? they want to know. Science as a question of public policy will be a central part of 21st Century environmentalism.

Dale Curtis, publisher of Greenwire, had the last word. Ask anyone what kind of world they want, and they'll tell you they would like a world "more natural, more pristine." But almost all people everywhere also want a middle-class American life: to live in cities or suburbs; to dwell in a spacious house with many appliances; to control convenient, personal transportation; and to be provided with easy year-round access to a wide range of goods and services. Satisfying those wants will require a doubling of manufacturing ouput and food production. That is the "unchangeable context" of the 21st Century, and it's hard to see how it can create a world that is more natural and pristine. That's not to say that there are no reasons for optimism; satisfaction should be taken from our success in reducing pollution, protecting wilderness, and establishing international frameworks for problem-solving. A hopeful future would include reform to keep special interests at bay; more of an emphasis on pollution prevention and new green technologies; the rise of ecosystem management as a land-use tool; and the explicit employment of science in the cause of environmental preservation.

Then Tony Cortese of Second Nature spoke eloquently on the intellectual and economic challenges of sustainability, and I asked the panel their views on property rights and the preservation of biodiversity, but that's a story for another time.

 

TODAY ON THE SITE

Do you fondly remember the elementary school teacher who loved to take field trips to the woods? Or the college professor who taught a great Enviro 101? Or the TV documentary-maker who made that series on the rainforest? We would love to hear about them and all other nominees for the first annual Green Apple Awards.

 

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