Down to Earth : environment and human needs

Plato lamented the destruction of soils and forests in ancient Greece. Dickens and Engels wrote eloquently of the wretched condi tions spawned by the Industrial Revolution. But the surge in concern about environmental quality over the last two decades has been uniquely widespread and impassioned.

The United Nations Conference on the Human Environment, held in Stockholm in 1972, provided a focal point for the gathering envi ronmental concerns of the 1960s. Inside the official conference hall representatives of the world's governments passed a lofty set of princi ples and voted for new forms of world cooperation.

Outside the official quarters thousands of groups and individuals displayed, through their enthusiastic lobbying and debates, the mounting strength of citizen action on environmental issues as well as the diversity of views propelling it. An inflatable whale, paraded through the streets, symbolized what many saw as the needless de struction of nature. Crippled victims of mercury poisoning from Minamata, Japan, embodied the dangers of unregulated industrial technology.