Welcome to the online companion to Forging Environmentalism, Justice, Livelihood and Contested Environments, published by M.E. Sharpe in May 2006. The book draws upon the work of the Council's multi-year, multi-site study of environmental values and policymaking.
The aim of this book is to enhance our understanding of the social and cultural values that people bring to bear on environmental problems and how they mobilize those values to forge environmentalism—to create and sustain programs and movements of environmental action in their communities and countries.
The book presents new case material that links scientific analysis to policy analysis and then goes one step beyond to do what few studies do: to examine the values of all the stakeholders and their processes of interaction. This holistic approach provides a basis for understanding how people in different parts of the world define environmental goals and objectives, how their values related to the environment are shaped by their lived realities, cultural contexts, and political struggles in which they forge their ideas about nature and the environment, and whose values matter in setting environmental priorities.
Click on the individual chapters below for a variety of chapter-specific resources, including: case synopses, timelines, and maps; related links and background readings; forewords of the country chapters provided in full; and a glossary of foreign words and acronyms that appear in the chapter.
Introduction
Part 1: Environmental Values in Four Countries
Part 2: Understanding Environmental Values Cross-Nationally
Part 3: Reflections on the Study of Environmental Values
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News and Corrections
Discussion Questions