Latest Articles

Can capitalism be harnessed to solve environmental problems, or is capitalism itself the problem?

When right-wing pundits and corporate flacks compare environmentalists to watermelons (green on the outside, red on the inside), they mean it as a slur. But when eco-socialists look at the wider environmental movement, they see a big green tomato that had better ripen up, and soon. Hybridizing the analyses of Karl Marx with those of […]

Manana Kochladze strives to protect Georgia from a BP oil pipeline

The Republic of Georgia, which gained its independence after the breakup of the Soviet Union, may be best known to Westerners as the birthplace of Josef Stalin. But this new democracy, bordered by the formidable Caucasus mountains, is also known for its alpine forests, stunning mountain gorges, and clear-running mineral springs. Kochladze. Photo: Goldman Environmental […]

The Fore Horsemen of the Apocalypse

Golf Courses Aren’t So Green Though the golf industry says it’s been striving to lighten its ecological impact, golf courses are increasingly flashpoints of environmental controversy. According to the Worldwatch Institute, the U.S. is home to some 18,000 golf courses — more than half the world’s 35,000 — covering 1.7 million acres and using 4 […]

A Hard Act to Follow

Report Finds Endangered Species Act Failing Over the first two decades the U.S. Endangered Species Act was in effect, from 1973 to 1994, 114 species went extinct or missing, “sacrificed to bureaucratic inertia, political meddling, and lack of leadership,” said Kieran Suckling of the Center for Biological Diversity, which released a report on the ESA […]

All Wet

Bush Wetlands Initiative Less Ambitious Than It Appears Attempting to neutralize John Kerry’s criticisms of his environmental record, President Bush traveled on Earth Day to Maine, a crucial swing state, and announced a wetlands initiative that aims to restore or protect some 3 million acres of wetlands over the next five years. Enviros, though, knocked […]

Earth Day? Bah Humbug!

Libia Grueso advocates for Afro-Colombians and their land

The Pacific Coast of Colombia, a narrow slice of jungle between the Andes and the ocean, is rich with plant and animal life. It’s also home to about a third of Colombia’s 10.6 million Afro-Colombians, descendants of black slaves emancipated in the mid-1800s. In recent years, this isolated area has been hit hard by logging, […]

Happy Earth Day! Anybody Got a Life Vest?

U.K. Report Warns of Rising Flood Dangers and Costs The U.K. government marked Earth Day with characteristic British cheer, releasing a report warning that much of the country is going to experience flooding in coming decades. According to an expert government panel, the cost of physical and psychological damage from floods in the U.K. is […]

Earth to Public: Come In, Public …

Earth Day Prompts Flurry of Electoral Rhetoric; Public Yawns Earth Day during a big election year inevitably prompts a flurry of earnest talk about the environment and which candidate is better for it, and today is no exception. President Bush touted his love of wetlands in Maine; John Kerry blasted Bush’s environmental record in Houston, […]

Action Heroes

How You Can Make a Difference for the Planet With today’s environmental problems so large, abstract, and intractable — see warming, global — you’re probably wondering what you, one individual, can do on Earth Day to help. (If you’re one of the people surveyed by Gallup — see above — perhaps you don’t care, but […]