I’ve written many essays, think pieces, and even short stories on political divides I find relevant in global and domestic politics. I’ve written them on divides from past eras and the current one. I’ve written them on racial divides, hierarchical divides, political party divides, and many others as well. But despite majoring in environmental science and only writing those other papers for classes or for my own interests, I have never once attempted to write about the environmental political divisions that society has faced. I have always found the task daunting to approach for two main reasons. The first being that I am far too opinionated on the topic to really give the opposing side a fair voice (not that I am not when writing on racial divisions just that environmental divisions both sides are much more deserving of a voice than that of bigotry), and the second being the conflicts immense complexity. There are many different sides to conservation and environmental policy and it isn’t as black and white as pro-environment and con-environment. There are many pro-environmental movements and theories that are at odds with one another and the same for con-environmental movements. Writing about such a topic when my knowledge is really only surface level beyond the science to it is an intimidating task but alas for a letter grade I will sacrifice whatever dignity I have in writing political thought pieces.
I’m going to start with my critical thinking question as I would like readers to have it in mind as they go through the rest of the blog and attempt to come up with a solution. The emerald ash borer is an invasive species of beetle that is currently threatening to wipe out all north American ash trees. This insect made its way over from south east asia because of lumber imports. At this point most conservation groups and the EPA consider it a fruitless goal to stop the emerald ash borer. I have been reading another book called the Bioeconomics of Invasive Species and in its opening paragraph it mentions that “Most often, however, the damages of invasive species are accepted as a new cost of doing business” (1).
Invasive species are being viewed as a cost of international trade, companies are accounting for them to occur. Is there anyway to provide proper incentive for companies to be preventative? Sure, we can fine companies for letting the invasive occur but I believe it’s proven that fines aren’t the most successful countermeasure to corporate greed.
Economics and the Environment are a dynamic duo that have been making the world turn round since the advent of time. Even though Miller states that economics is “the social science that deals with the production, distribution, and consumption of goods and services to satisfy people’s needs and wants” (2) I would go further and argue the core of economics is the consumption of resources. In their own form competition and species specialization are their own form of economics. However in a specifically human context our economy is limited by the environment’s capacity to provide resources for these goods and services and our policy needs to change to reflect that. To help put this into context, the figure below represents the work of a research team that attempted to show the values of Earth’s resources and functions.
I inherently take issue with their table on the grounds that they “included only renewable ecosystem services, excluding non-renewable fuels and minerals and the atmosphere” (3) and this statement combined with some of their listings comes off as very misleading. Although raw materials and soil are renewable resources plenty are about as renewable as fossil fuels. Currently the world is facing an arable land and phosphorus crisis (which sadly not many people seem to car about). Soil takes 1000 of years to form and we can only revitalize our current soil with fertilizer so many times, and currently we use it at an alarmingly unsustainable rate. Phosphorus is even worse as it is required to form the building blocks which make life on earth possible and the only input of phosphorus the ecosystem has are undersea metamorphic rocks that get pushed to the surface and can take millions of years to form. Neither of these two resources are reasonably sustainable but we use them at an alarming rate and this table puts them next to natural greenhouse gas regulation as if comparing planting a tree is in the same category of renewable as the formation of usable phosphorus.
I believe we need policy that promotes and subsidizes Sustainable business. If we can promote business that have negligible or potentially even positive effects on the environment (4) this could slow down our resource consumption to give researchers the time they need to find synthetic alternatives or ways to synthesize these materials that we are so dependent on. However, this brings me to my next point. Environmental policy needs to subsidize environmental research, I believe it is of the most importance to find the necessary solutions and alternatives to our resource based limitations. The role of environmental law is to protect our environment while also allowing us to use the resources they provide responsibly and sustainably (5). However, some would argue that the law isn’t on our side, Ernest Patridge writes in Consumer or Citizen, that “the road back to authentic democracy will be difficult, for the oligarchs will not willingly surrender their ill-gotten power and privilege” (6) and goes further to state that “a reintroduction of civic education (“Civics” and History), both formal and informal” (7) to empower the citizens and force our democracy back into the hands of the people.
Patridge’s argument has some key flaws in it. Firstly, he claims that there must be a return to an authentic democracy. However, that assumes that there was an authentic democracy in the first place. Our nation, the United States was founded on bigotry, it was never a true democracy. Secondly, Patridge goes on to say that we must break up the media conglomeration and that a fairness doctrine must be enforced (8). Patridge’s fairness doctrine implies that there isn’t a pro-conglomerate sentiment amongst the people of the United States. What happens when we enforce this fairness doctrine and the people immediately reinstate a new media conglomerate? What is the plan then?
Word Count: 1057
Citations:
1- Keller, Reuben P. Bioeconomics of Invasive Species. [Electronic Resource] : Integrating Ecology, Economics, Policy, and Management. Oxford University Press, 2009.
2- Miller, G. Tyler, and Scott E. Spoolman. Living in the Environment. Chapter 23: Economics, Environment, and Sustainability. 19th ed. Boston, MA: Engage Learning, 2020.
3- Costanza, Robert et. Al. “The value of the world’s ecosystem services and natural capital” Nature Vol. 387, May 1997.
4- https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sustainable_business
5- https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Environmental_law
6,7,8- Partridge, Ernest. “Consumer or Citizen?” The Online Gladfly, April 2002.
Environmental Studies and Science 