Conservation movement

IDENTIFICATION: Activities of individuals, private organizations, and government agencies to preserve natural resources or establish policies for using them wisely

The early conservation movement focused attention on the perilous state of natural resources as human societies moved toward increasing commercialization and urbanization in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. Proponents of conservation continue to work to convey the importance of resource sustainability.

The roots of the conservation movement can be traced to Europe during the late eighteenth century. Individuals repulsed by the growing commercialization and dehumanization brought on the by the Industrial Revolution promoted a return to nature. While some areas had been preserved in their natural state for centuries, either as hunting grounds or as refuges for the upper classes, during the nineteenth century governments in Europe and in North America began setting aside green space, even in urban areas, for recreation and relaxation. In some countries, notably Germany, government control over forests and rivers was used not only to conserve natural resources but also to generate revenues from the harvest of renewable resources such as trees and wildlife. Coordinated efforts to preserve wilderness areas, however, emerged first in the United States. The initiatives of individuals and organizations involved in these efforts grew into the modern conservation movement.

Beginnings of the Movement

From its inception, the conservation movement in the United States was highly decentralized, but people who became involved shared an overarching goal: to preserve some aspect of the natural world from the ravages of rampant commercial development and urbanization. Efforts to save some of America’s wilderness areas from the encroachment of civilization led to the creation of Yellowstone National Park in 1872, and some states had taken steps to set aside particularly beautiful areas (many of them difficult to reach). On the other hand, the first true conservation bill passed by the U.S. Congress in 1876 was vetoed by President Ulysses Grant.

Although American writers such as Henry David Thoreau had celebrated the value of the natural landscape, the first true conservationist to emerge on the national scene was John Muir. A Scotsman who had settled in California, Muir spent most of his adult life writing about the beauties of the wilderness, particularly the Yosemite Valley, a preserve set aside by the state in 1864. At that time many people looked upon the wilderness as a place of escape from the grime of city life. Powerful commercial interests, however, saw unsettled areas as opportunities for profit. The mining and timber industries coveted the natural resources there, farmers and ranchers sought lands for grazing, and railroads saw possibilities in creating tourist destinations or shorter routes between centers.

Muir was one of dozens of amateurs who made their livings by other means but devoted their lives to saving the country’s wilderness for future generations. Many were responsible for creating new national parks or monuments, saving sites that had been commercialized (such as Niagara Falls), or establishing wildlife sanctuaries to preserve dwindling numbers of birds, fish, and mammals. Muir lobbied to preserve Yosemite and additional wilderness sites. Eventually he found a strong ally in President Theodore Roosevelt, a lifelong sportsman and conservationist who used his political power to establish numerous national monuments to save lands from mining, timbering, and settlement. Muir was a preservationist. His goal was to have lands set aside, protected from all development or use.

A second important figure in the conservation movement, Gifford Pinchot, could best be described as a utilitarian. Pinchot earned a degree in forestry and eventually became head of the US Forest Service, making him one of the first professional conservationists. He argued that natural resources should be managed carefully, but renewable resources should be available for commercial purposes. These two views came to dominate the debate among conservationists for nearly a century as groups struggling to preserve sites intact clashed with those who saw responsible use as a viable alternative to saving lands from outright, wholesale exploitation.

Over the next century the conservation movement would be advanced by both amateurs and professionals. A few crossed from one group to the other. Notable among them was Stephen T. Mather, who made a fortune in business and then turned his talents to creating the National Park Service in 1916, for which he served as the first director. Intent on preserving the national parks for future generations, Mather often found himself pitted against Pinchot and the Forest Service in debates concerning the proper balance between preservation and commercial use of national lands.

Spurred by Muir’s leadership, in 1892 a group of Californians formed the Sierra Club, which would become a driving force in promoting conservation throughout the United States. Similar organizations sprang up in the East, many modeled on the first such club, the Appalachian Mountain Club, established in 1876.

Eventually the idea of conservation grew to include wildlife as well as landscape. Ironically, some of the most avid conservationists were sportsmen. They recognized that careful management of game populations would ensure that hunters could enjoy their sport for decades to come. Aware of what wanton slaughter had done to the American bison population during the nineteenth century, they often lobbied for limits on the numbers of animals that individual hunters could kill.

Conservationist groups were not always successful, however. Despite the protests of the Sierra Club and others, the US government agreed to the creation of the Hetch Hetchy Dam in the Yosemite area to provide water for San Francisco, causing the loss of millions of hectares of natural landscape. Lobbying did push several presidents to create wildlife refuges, setting aside lands where game animals lived or that they used as migratory routes. Eventually these sanctuaries became part of the National Wildlife Refuge System.

Between the World Wars

By the end of World War I a number of conservation groups were active in the United States. Individual organizations, however, tended to focus on single aspects of conservation. For example, the Audubon Society, founded in 1905, limited its interest to the plight of birds, while the Izaak Walton League, established in 1922, was concerned with the condition of rivers and lakes because its members were involved in sportfishing. In fact, during this period many conservation organizations were underwritten by firearms companies and sports businesses. As a result, the utilitarian view of conservation tended to be favored in political decisions.

Concurrently, preservationists such as the National Park Service’s Mather tried to have more lands set aside; on occasion these efforts were supported by financiers such as John D. Rockefeller, Jr., who purchased properties to expand or create parks. Some narrow-minded conservation efforts led to ecological disasters, however. For example, by the 1920s the gray wolf population in Yellowstone National Park was eliminated, ostensibly to make the park safer for tourists (and for the livestock of nearby ranchers). The absence of these predators led to an explosion of the ruminant population, which then overgrazed the available vegetation; eventually thousands of elk and deer starved.

The election of Franklin D. Roosevelt as president in 1932 brought one of the most active proponents of the conservationist movement into the White House. Roosevelt had a genuine love of the outdoors and was a conservationist at heart. He was a utilitarian when it came to conservation, however, and above all a politician. He believed that a government-controlled program of land retirement, soil and forest restoration, flood control, and hydroelectric power generation would serve two aims simultaneously: The nation’s natural landscapes could be preserved or put to good use at the same time people could be given meaningful employment.

Combining his zeal for conservation with the need to revitalize the American economy during the Great Depression, Roosevelt created numerous programs to further the improvement of the nation’s natural resources. Notable among these were the Civilian Conservation Corps and the Works Progress Administration, agencies that put people to work improving national parks and other wilderness areas, making them accessible to the public, and restoring many of the renewable resources that had been lost over the years to commercial development. Among his principal successes, Roosevelt oversaw the opening of Great Smoky Mountains National Park in 1934.

Not all of the projects Roosevelt promoted under the banner of conservation were beneficial to the natural environment, however. The Tennessee Valley Authority oversaw the erection of numerous dams to provide hydroelectric power to rural communities, in the process destroying millions of hectares of forestlands and valleys. Politically, the most significant change in the conservation movement under Roosevelt was the affiliation of environmental causes with the Democrats rather than the Republicans, who had been leaders in conservation in previous years.

Conservation after

After World War II ended, the United States entered a period of economic prosperity that saw the population grow and industry expand to meet worldwide demand for American goods. As a result, individuals and corporations interested in development lobbied for relaxation of conservation rules that had been put in place during the previous six decades. Many argued for a return to commercial operations in government-protected areas. Conservation groups, which by then numbered in the dozens, fought back with mixed success to maintain and expand the protections in place.

Organizations such as the Sierra Club and the Wilderness Society developed activist tactics to bring attention to the long-term dangers of development in wilderness areas. These groups were successful in defeating a plan to create a on the Green River at Echo Park, on the Utah-Colorado border, during the 1950s. Most notably, under the leadership of the Wilderness Society’s executive secretary Howard Zahniser, conservationists prodded Congress to pass the Wilderness Act in 1964. That law set aside more than 3.6 million hectares (9 million acres) of land, restricting even minimal development or human use.

The publication of Rachel Carson’s Silent Spring in 1962, detailing the environmental dangers of toxic waste, gave new impetus to the conservationists and sparked the larger environmental movement. As a consequence, during the 1960’s conservation groups began to unite with those interested in larger environmental issues. Sierra Club executive director David Brower became a leading spokesman for environmental causes. The most significant success achieved by these groups in lobbying governmental agencies was the passage of the National Environmental Policy Act of 1969, which established the government’s role in protecting humans and the natural from damage caused by human development or technology. In December, 1970, the Environmental Protection Agency was established to enforce environmental policies throughout the United States.

International Conservation Efforts

By the middle of the twentieth century, the modern conservation movement had become international. The record of conservation groups in Europe was strong; many had been successful in continuing and strengthening already existing laws to preserve natural resources. Beginning during the 1960s conservationists in Australia led highly organized campaigns to reverse the effects of human contamination on the natural environment, specifically targeting problems with the quality of soils and the eradication of several species of animals. In Africa, Asia, and South America, however, conservationists had mixed success. Often conservation efforts conflicted with the needs of the people for resources to support life. This was especially true in Africa, where native peoples relied on wildlife for sustenance, and in South America, where lands covered by rain forests were needed for farming. Some successes were achieved when native populations were convinced that conservation would provide long-term economic stability.

At the same time, however, commercial interests continued to harvest animals and timber far in excess of the population’s needs, ignoring the environmental catastrophes caused by their actions. Often, government-sponsored programs wreaked havoc on natural resources. Nowhere was this more apparent than in China, where the need for energy to fuel the country’s growing population and expanding industrial base led to construction of the massive Three Gorges Dam on the Yangtze River, flooding millions of hectares, destroying or seriously affecting land and riverine populations. From 1970 onward, however, China began to take an active approach to wildlife preservation, as did several other Asian nations.

One of the most successful conservation initiatives undertaken outside the United States has been that of the Central American nation of Costa Rica. Beginning in 1970 the Costa Rican government worked to create a highly developed national park system where conservation practices would be strictly enforced. By 2000 nearly 25 percent of Costa Rica’s landmass had been set aside for preservation.

Conservationists across the world continued to work to preserve the environment throughout the twenty-first century. In the United States, much of the modern conservation movement is led by the U.S. Forest Service. As part of this goal, the Forest Service has enacted various measures to protect the environment against Global Climate Change. Various nonprofits and state-level organizations also worked to reduce polution, improve land management, and educate the public about conservation.

Bibliography

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