Local Environmental Struggles Citizen Activism in the Treadmill of Production [Hardcover]

The authors analyse the difficulties involved in local environmentalism.Three case studies--a wetlands protection project, water pollution of the Great Lakes, and consumer waste recycling--demonstrate the opportunities and constraints on local environmental action posed by economic and political structures at all levels.Three case studies--a wetlands protection project, water pollution of the Great Lakes, and consumer waste recycling--demonstrate the opportunities and constraints on local environmental action posed by economic and political structures at all levels.In recent years, environmentalism in the United States has increasingly emerged at the community level, focusing on local ecological problems. The authors critique the modern environmental mantra, think globally, act locally, by analyzing the opportunities and constraints on local environmental action posed by economic and political structures at all levels. Three case studies--a wetlands protection project, water pollution of the Great Lakes, and consumer waste recycling--demonstrate the challenges facing citizen-worker movements.Preface; 1. Transnational structures and the limits of local resistance; 2. The terrain of environmental conflicts: local wetland watchers and a national movement organization; 3. Slights of hand: how public participation in remediation of water pollution fails to trickle down; 4. Recycling: organizing local grass roots around a national cash-roots policy; 5. From local to transnational strategies: toward a model of sustainable mobilization; References; Author index; Subject index. The book takes an interesting look at the politics of environmentalism... J.S. Schwartz, Choice