The Making of the New Environmental Consciousness

Environmental issues throughout the world are increasingly becoming a permanent feature in political and everyday life. This series looks at the social and political aspects of the environmental crisis. International and multi-disciplinary in scope, the series aims to provide scholarly and up-to-date studies of some of the key issues facing environmental movements both in the past and in the present. This book is a systematic comparative analysis of environmentalism in Sweden, Denmark and the Netherlands over the last 30 years, showing how each country has developed its own "shade" of green. The authors pinpoint four stages which the three countries share, and describe the political and cultural forces which have pushed environmentalism in different directions.
They argue that Denmark's vital "grass roots" environmental movement, successful in stopping nuclear energy, has links with the 19th century co-operative movement; that a long tradition of pragmatism in Holland has resulted in a broad and pluralistic collection of environmental groups; and that, because environmental issues have been actively embraced by the established political culture, Sweden now boasts the second largest parliamentary green party in Europe.