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		Affirmative Action for the Earth 
		-- a Strategy Proposal
		
		  by Alan McGowen

The Opportunity

Environmentalism now has a strong supporter in Vice President Al Gore,
and in President Clinton we have a supporter to a degree not seen in that 
office for a long while. In addition we have Democratic platform planks and 
campaign promises for action. All of this means that environmental concerns 
will be heard in the new administration -- they will be "on stage". But it 
does *not* mean that they will be center stage. Al Gore may believe that 
environmentalism is the coming "organizing principle" for global politics, 
but Clinton has as yet sent no strong signals that he either holds that 
position -- or opposes it.

Given Clinton's style of building consensus it seems likely that in this
administration the squeakiest wheels will tend to get the most grease. This 
suggests that environmentalists should push our case with redoubled vigor. 
It is true that many groups which have been long ignored will be doing this, 
and it is possible that -- as Clinton did with the Rev. Jesse Jackson during 
the election campaign -- the new administration may find it necessary or 
expedient to distance itself from some of these. But so long as 
environmentalists can avoid sounding shrill or extreme in the major media 
coverage, we have a better chance of success by taking a high profile than 
a moderate one, in large measure thanks to the presence of Gore.

What is the best way to take this "unshrill" high profile? And what should 
be its main direction? 

We have a golden opportunity to reverse the concerted efforts of the White 
House and conservative think tanks during the past 12 years. They attempted
with mixed success to paint real, deep-green environmentalists as fringe 
elements -- "bunny lovers and tree-huggers" --  while presenting the 
greenwashed, pollution-credits-trading, technical-fix industrialists as the
"true" environmentalists. But the public responds very favorably to the
central emotional elements of deep-green environmentalism. Respect for nature
and love of the Earth, the sense that other forms of life have a "right to 
be there" and a general appreciation for wilderness, even if only in the 
images of television -- all these values are to an amazing degree readily 
promulgated and readily accepted. As a result, the forces defending the 
consumptive status-quo have never succeeded in tarnishing the heroic glow 
which surrounds Greenpeace, for example, despite strenuous efforts to do so. 
The image of the tiny rubber boats protecting whales against huge ships has 
proven impenetrable to the sharpest harpoons of ultraconservative scorn.

We should not, therefore, become overtimid in our efforts to be "unshrill"
-- rather we should seek to move the center gradually so that what now seems 
"shrill" environmentalism becomes perceived, a few years hence, as merely 
strong advocacy, and what now seems "conservative" becomes perceived as 
reactionary atavism. Ronald Reagan supplied us with the textbook for making 
such shifts in the center. Clinton appears ready to apply that textbook
in the opposite direction on many fronts -- and environmentalists should 
"piggyback" a similar effort onto his overall thrust to construct a very 
large Democratic coalition. Success at such piggybacking is absolutely 
essential if our message is ever to become the mainstream view, and integrated
with the programs of both Congress and the White House. This does not threaten
us with essential dilution if a small number of central values and goals are 
preserved inviolate, but are advocated only to the degree that is suitable 
in any given venue.  

I shall not discuss any deep-green *values* here, but shall simply take one
as a touchstone for all the rest: a deep and abiding love of nature and 
the Earth. In all the trappings of wise-use argumentation and appeals to
anthropocentric expedience we must never be ashamed to display this love -- 
simply, quietly, but openly and tenaciously. To the sneers which we will 
inevitably receive we should respond that these are the values of most 
Americans and that there is nothing whatsoever shameful about them -- that 
indeed, Mr. Sneerer, just what does *your* elitism stem from and signify?
The Reagan Administration made such tactics famous, but we can now use them 
ourselves. We cannot always rest our case on that love, especially when 
addressing those who love principally their own consumption or aggrandizement
and care nothing for the Earth. But we should always wear it openly.  In 
truth, we can never hope to succeed if we act as if we need to apologize
for our love of this life-rich planet or to rationalize it in a language of
exclusively human utility. Let the sneerers first rationalize the primacy of
their own consumptive greed.

I shall, however, discuss *goals*. A few clear, understandable, and central 
goals should articulate our deepest values and carry them towards practice.
Within these few goals, a great many long-term strategies and shorter-term
tactics can be developed. I shall also suggest one main principle which
I believe should form the thrust of environmentalism for the next few decades:
Affirmative Action for the Earth.



Goals and Tactics for Environmentalism in the Clinton Administration

The two ultimate goals of environmentalism have always been, firstly, to get 
the human impact on the biosphere down to levels which are sustainable in the 
sense that all the evolutionary and ecological processes which generate and 
maintain the Earth's richness of life can continue to operate fully, and 
secondly, to increase public awareness and deepen public understanding of 
the issues (to "raise consciousness") until environmentalism truly becomes the
"central organizing principle for all of civilization" that Vice President 
Gore has stated it must. The first ultimate goal cannot possibly be achieved 
in the remainder of this century, and may not be fully achieved even by the
end of the next. But the second ultimate goal is one we must seriously
attempt to achieve as rapidly as public opinion can be shifted -- within 
this century if that is at all possible.  The attempt must at least be made,
and it must be made with all deliberate speed. 

Three areas of focus are important: technology, consumption, and population.

The Clinton Administration seems clearly committed to pursuing "new 
environmental technologies". While there is much that is necessary and
commendable about this, it is crucial that we not allow the idea to run 
rampant that technical fixes alone are sufficient to handle everything. And 
this attitude is likely to have some fertile ground during the Administration 
thanks to its "let's make more infrastructure" orientation, and its emphasis
on "no pain" environmentalism ("grow the economy through environmental 
technologies"), so we must be especially vigilant here. It isn't that some 
growth of this sort can't be achieved -- high speed rails and better urban 
mass transit would certainly reduce per capita impact and would also create 
jobs -- but it's a complete delusion to think that any form of growth, no
matter how "green", is all by itself the path to sustainability. 

Total consumption is going to have to decrease in the overdeveloped world 
while per capita consumption increases in much of the developing world. This 
presents us with two horrendous problems: finding the "right", "sustainable", 
"just" or whatever you want to call it level (or range) of consumption, and 
figuring out how to convince people that this value, rather than infinity, 
ought to be the target of economic systems. This is probably the most important
area we could make progress on (in public opinion) during the next decade. It
is probably also the most difficult, the area where the strongest opposition
will occur. 

Population is also going to have to come down. Here it is important to make
people understand the central role of population in impacts on the biosphere,
and it is very clear that a huge effort for public education in basic 
ecological science is necessary before this can be grasped. Because the 
population trends are going to be much worse in developing nations than they
will be in developed nations during the next half-century, this turns out
to be easier to promulgate in the developed world than the need for reductions
of consumption. But in fact even in the developed world population reductions
are needed to free up land for ecological restoration. During the next decade,
we should try to lay the foundation for public understanding of the need
for this and of the importance of ecosystem restoration.

There are specific legislative goals which are important in the next several
years: ensuring that Congress passes strong enabling legislation for all
the UNCED treaties, that the Endangered Species Act is reauthorized and
strengthened to include ecosystem protection, that a National Institutes
for Biodiversity is established, and so on. 


Affirmative Action for the Earth

Something is needed to tie all of these goals and values together into
a single political idea. Ecosystem restoration is the perfect model:
it is a kind of "affirmative action" for the Earth, attempting to give
back some room for evolution to operate -- attempting to right a human-created
planetary injustice. Extending the concept of affirmative action to nature
is the exact political concept needed to continue the growth of social justice
into the ecocentrism needed to become tomorrow's "organizing principle for 
all of civilization". 

Let us take it as our goal, for the next decade or so, to establish the
legislative principle of affirmative action for the Earth, and let the
touchstone of our success be the extent to which we can achieve goals
which are not justified primarily by anthropocentric "wise use" arguments
but by notions of justice and respect for nature. The protection and
restoration of ecosystems, the return of historical range to species,
reversing local extinctions -- these are the measures of our success. 

When the wolves again howl where they have not been heard for a century 
and more, we will know we have been on the right path.

------------
Alan McGowen