Introduction
| Date | 01 July 1991 |
| Published date | 01 July 1991 |
| DOI | http://doi.org/10.1002/pad.4230110402 |
| Author | A. Atkinson |
PUBLIC ADMINISTRATION AND DEVELOPMENT, Vol. 11,303-305 (1991)
Introduction
A. ATKINSON
University
College,
London
At the end of the
1980s
‘the environment’ re-emerged at the top of the political
agenda. Such a surge of interest in environmental problems has surfaced from time
to time. The last major manifestation of this was in the early
1970s,
when hundreds
of thousands of Americans celebrated ‘Earth Day’ and President Nixon instituted
a radically new environmental management regime. In
1972
the United Nations
organized a conference on the environment, in Stockholm, from which emerged
the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP), projecting the new perspective
on environmental issues into the development debate.
The
1973
oil crisis eclipsed the environment as major political issue and the follow-
ing years saw the emergence of economic recession, initially in the industrialized
countries and, from
1980
on, the ‘international debt crisis’ cast a deepening shadow
over the economies of much of the developing world. Seemingly, nobody could
afford to be concerned about the environment any longer.
However, in a low profile way, the construction of environmental institutions
and management mechanisms continued to occupy governments in both industrial-
ized and developing countries, such that, by the late
1980s,
there existed in all
countries some government, semi-government and/or substantially organized non-
government framework for studying and managing environmental problems.
The new concern that suddenly arose in the late
1980s
was therefore not, as in
the early
1970s,
concerned with the non-existence of environmental management
mechanisms, but rather about the fact that the problems which they were supposed
to be overcoming were continuing to escalate: clearly things were still not right
and something needed to be done about it. At both the international and the national
level there were immediate responses.
The United Nations Commission on Environment and Development issued the
results of its findings-known as the Brundtland Report-putting the concept of
‘sustainable development’ on the political agenda, calling for far broader measures
to achieve environmental protection than had previously been envisaged within the
framework
of
the existing national environmental institutions.
A
series of initially
ad
hoc
and thence more permanent international meetings and forums were arranged,
to address what were now being seen awerious global environmental threats of
ozone depletion and the ‘greenhouse effect’. At national and local level as well,
environmental problems took on a new urgency and new resources were infused
into existing environmental institutions. Environmental non-government organiza-
Dr Adrian Atkinson is Course Director in Environmental Planning and Management at the Development
Planning Unit, University College London.
027
1-270519
1/040303-03%05.00
0
1991
by
John
Wiley
&
Sons,
Ltd.
To continue reading
Request your trial