In the first wave, which began in the 1860s and continued through the

interwar period, three varieties of environmental thought competed to

construct a diagnosis of environmental degradation and an alternative
vision to it: the aback to the landau movement, the scientific
conservation movement, and the wilderness movement. The ãback to the
landä movement found strong adherents in England and Germany, as
industrialization brought a revival of agrarian sentiment. data end with
1991). Guha differentiates deep ecologists from environmental justice
activists in American radical environmentalism. A section on the
German Greens, the finest achievement of the second wave of
environmentalism (p. 97), completes this chapter. Guha cites Gandhian
influences in all of these branches of modern environmentalism, but still
sees a strong polarization between this environmentalism of the affluent
and the environmentalism of the poor of the next chapter. on the first
wave of environmentalism, best achieves Guhaâs two aims: to present a
ãtrans-national perspective on the environmental debateä and ãto
document the flow of ideas across culturesä
environmental ideas, despite the fact that global news reports, the
internet, and international travel and meetings have shrunk the effective
distance between peoples
During environmentalism's first wave in the 19th and early 20th centuries,
naturalists, officers, and philosophers responded to industrialization and
modern state power with three different ideals about the proper
relationships between humanity and nature. Guha calls these ideals:
"back to the land," "scientific conservation," and the "wilderness idea,"
and explores their divergent visions and experimental policies. Within
the second wave, environmentalism evolved from an intellectual
response into a series of mass movements in America, Europe, and the
world. Environmental activists in the United States, Germany and
elsewhere brought environmentalism mass appeal and divergent goals in
the form of deep ecology and environmental justice movements.
Environmental movements from the global south challenged the ideals
and policies of affluent, post-industrialized northern environmentalists.
Socialism and Communism confronted the environment in unique ways
as well. Finally, in recent decades environmentalists from around the
world have gathered in Rio, Kyoto and elsewhere to debate and to
develop an increasingly unified global environmental movement, with
mixed results. Guha treats both waves of environmentalism within a
global scope, in diverse ecological and national contexts.