Chapter 6: Historical Background and Events

What year did James Watt adapt the steam engine to run machinery?

1763

When did James Hargreaves invent the Spinning Jenny?

1764

When did Adam Smith publish The Wealth of Nations

1776

When was the first National Park established (and what park)?

1872; Yellowstone

When was the Sierra Club established, and what did they do?

1892; defend Yosemite National Park

When did the National Audubon Society form, and what did they do?

1905; protect marine birds from fashionable use

When did the world population reach 2 billion?

1927

When did the U.S. drop nuclear bombs on Hiroshima and Nagaski?

1945

When was the Universal Declaration on Human Rights adopted by the UN General Assembly?

1948

When did the world population reach 3 billion?

1960

When did Rachel Carson write Silent Spring?

1962

When did congress pass the Clear Air Act?

1963

When did Garrett Hardin published the Tragedy of the Commons?

1968

When did Apollo 11 land on the moon?

1969

When was the first Earth Day?

1970

When was Limits to Growth published?

1972

When was the UN Conference on the Human Environment - Stockholm?

1962

When was the Blue Marble picture released?

1972

When did the world population reach 4 billion?

1974

When was the Brundtland Commission (WCED) established?

1983

When was the Antarctic ozone hole discovered?

1985

When did the world population reach 5 billion?

1987

When did the WCED release the Brundtland Report titled “Our Common Future”?

1987

What was the IPCC formed?

1988

When was the Exxon Valdez oil spill?

1989

When was the Montreal Protocol established?

1989

When was the first Earth Summit held in Rio de Janeiro?

1992

When was the Kyoto Protocol on GHGs ratified?

1997

When were the UN MDGs ratified?

1999

When did the world population reach 6 billion?

1999

When was Earth Charter launched?

2000

When was the Earth Summit Rio+10 (Johannesburg)?

2001

When was the UN Millenium Ecosystem Assessment initiated? 

2005

When was ISSP established?

2007

When did the world population reach 7 billion?

2011

When was the United Nations Conference on Sustainable Development (Rio+20)?

2012

When was the UN 2030 Agenda on SDGs adopted?

2015

When was the Paris Agreement signed at COP21?

2015

When did ISSP lanuch credentials?

2016

What is the Age of Discovery?

The Age of Discovery spanned the 15th to 18th centuries and marked a time of globalization, discovery, and expansion of trade

As the Age of Discovery came to a close, what did Western Europe become interested in?

scientific inquiry

How did Adam Smith’s The Wealth of Nations (1776) help drive development of new technologies leading into the industrial age?

Adam’s Smith’s The Wealth of Nations book published in 1776, explained laissez-faire economic doctrine, which fosters a free-market environment ideal for the development of new technologies

What is the Industrial Age?

1700s; marked by innovations that significantly changed the economic and social systems of the world, and consequently, the ecological systems

What was a driving force of the Industrial Age?

James Watts’ adaptation of the steam engine to run machinery

What inventions changesd the lives of workers in industrial societies?

The Spinning Jenny and Power loom

What happened as a result of mass production?

Mass production made products cheaper, increasing demand for both the products, fuel, and raw materials needed to manufacture them; As the market for cheap products grew, so it the demand for cheap albor often underpinned by unsafe and unfair working conditions

How did the increase of coal production result in dangerous working conditions?

Coal production increased from 4.7 million tons in 1750 to 250 million tons in 1900, requiring miners to dig even deeper, resulting in increasingly dangerous working conditions and longer hours of work

How are NGOs linked to slavery abolition and voter rights?

• NGOs (also known as civil society) began playing a critical role in enviornmental and social health beginning in the late 18th century

• Trace origins back to 1787 when a dozen people in London organized to abolish slave trade, and then came together in 1840 to convene the World Anti-Slavery Convention.

  • Largely attended by men, and two female abolitionists were denied seats on the floor – they went onto (Elizabeth Cady Stanton and Lucretia Mott) be leaders of the suffragette movement

When did environmentally-focused NGOs arise?

Environmentally-focused NGOs arose in late 19th century as the Industrial Revolution continued to destroy wildlife and other forms of natural capital

What are examples of environmentally-focused NGOs?

Sierra Club formed in 1982 to protect Yosemite

National Audubon Society formed in 1905 to protect water birds from exploitation

Who were early conservationists?

John Muir, GIfford Pinchit, Theodore Roosevelt, and Franklin Roosevelt

What was the issue with the early conservationist movement?

Their movement was devoid of diversity and excluded Indigenous Peoples

What did Rachel Carson’s Silent Spring do?

• Rachel Carson’s Silent Spring in 1962 described the decline of bird populations due to man-made chemicals, which sounded the alarms of the environmental crisis to the public

What is an alternative to modern capitalism’s economic structure?

steady-state economy — emphasizing development overgrowth and deployment of appropriate technology to improve lives in developing countries and rural areas in environmentally and socially supportive ways

Why did NGOs attack GNP and GDP

NGOs and ecological economists attacked the GNP and GDP for giving false impressions about the new benefits of economic growth by ignoring all environmental and human costs

What came out of the UN Charter of 1945?

• Focused on peace, human rights, social progress, and respect for international treaties and laws

• The organs of the UN were established: the General Assembly, the Security Council, the Economic and Social Council, the Trusteeship Council, The International Court of Justice, and teh UN Secretariat

How did the UN come to define sustainable development?

• UN produced the Conference on the Human Environment in 1972, which set the stage for the concept of sustainable development

• UN Secretary-General determined an organization independent from the UN’s central body should take the lead – in 1983, Javier Perez de Cuellar asked Gro Harlem Brundtland to chair a World Commission on the Environment and Development (WCED)

  • The Brundtland report changed sustainable development from a physical notion to a much broader concept that linked economic and ecological policies in an integrated framework

What were the outcomes of the Rio Earth Summit in 1992?

• Five major outcomes

  • Rio Declaration on Environment and Development

  • Agenda 21

  • United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCC)

  • Statement on Forest Principles

  • United Nations Convention on Biological Diversity

• The Earth Summit spurred the formation of the three Rio Conventions on climate, biodiversity, and desertification, as well as spurred creation of the World Business Council for Sustainable Development (WBCSD)

What was the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCC) tasked with?

tasked with long-term objective of stabilizing GHGs

How did the UNFCC lead to the Kyoto Protocol being ratified?

Voluntary emission reductions were not enough to reduce GHGs. In 1997, at the third COP3, countries signed the Kyoto Protocol in order to “reduce emissions 5.2% below 1990 levels by 2012”

Why is the Montreal Protocol a good example of how we can come together to solve environmental issues?

In 1970s, evidence began to mount on human-produced chemicals (CFCs), had a negative impact on the ozone layer in the stratosphere. The Montreal Protocol promoted cooperation in research and information exchange, and adopted mechanisms to discourage activities, such as phasing out manufacturer and use of ozone-depleting substances

When were the MDGs established?

At the UN Millenium Development Summit in 2000

What did the MDGs focus on?

• Eradicating extreme poverty and hunger

• Improving maternal health

• Achieving universal primary education

• Combatting HIV/ADIS, malaria, and other diseases

• Promote gender equality and empower women

• Reduce child mortality

• Ensuring environmental sustainability

• Developing a global partnership for development

What came out of the World Summit on Sustainable Development (WSSD) in 2002?

Johannseburg Declaration on Sustainable Development – focused on the worldwide conditions that pose severe threats to sustainable development of our people

How did the SDGs get establishsed?

• The United Nations Conference on Sustainable Development (UNCSD) returned to Rio de Janiero in 2010 to replace the MDGs

• Set in motion a process for developing a set of universal goals that meet the urgent environmental, political, and economic challenges facing our world

What has our progress been like on the SDGs?

In 2021, there was no SDG progress on single goal. COVID-19 had pushed millions of people back into poverty and chronic hunger as well.

What is the Paris Agreement?

At the UNFCC’s 21st COP in Paris 2015 , the UN General Assembly approved the most concerted global effort to halt climate change to date, by keeping global average temperature increases well below 2 degrees celsius