BiblioVault - Books about Environmental protection

The Law and Policy of Ecosystem Services

J. B. Ruhl, Steven E. Kraft, and Christopher L. Lant

Island Press, 2007

The Law and Policy of Ecosystem Services is the first comprehensive exploration of the status and future of natural capital and ecosystem services in American law and policy. The book develops a framework for thinking about ecosystem services across their ecologic, geographic, economic, social, and legal dimensions and evaluates the prospects of crafting a legal infrastructure that can help build an ecosystem service economy that is as robust as existing economies for manufactured goods, natural resource commodities, and human-provided services. The book examines the geographic, ecological, and economic context of ecosystem services and provides a baseline of the current status of ecosystem services in law and society. It identifies shortcomings of current law and policy and the critical areas for improvement and forges an approach for the design of new law and policy for ecosystem services.

Included are a series of nine empirical case studies that explore the problems caused by society’s failure to properly value natural capital. Among the case study topics considered are water issues, The Conservation Reserve Program, the National Conservation Buffer Initiative, the agricultural policy of the European Union, wetland mitigation, and pollution trading.

The Law and Policy of Ecosystem Services is a groundbreaking look at the question of whether and how law and policy can shape a sustainable system of ecosystem service management. It is an accessible and informative work for faculty, students, and policy makers concerned with ecology, economics, geography, political science, environmental studies, law, and related fields.

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Learning to Listen to the Land

Edited by Bill Willers

Island Press, 1991

In this inspired collection, some of America's most provocative thinkers and writers reflect on nature and enviornmetnal science--reaching compelling conclusions about humanity's relationship to the earth. Balanced by science and fact, Learning to Listen to the Land explains the significance of our modern environmental crisis. The authors underscore the necessity forworking within, rather than counter to, our larger ecosystem.
Learning to Listen to the Land represents the sounding of an alarm. It's authors call on us to recognize the consequences of our actions, and inactions, and to develop a sense of connection with the earth.

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Let the People Judge

Wise Use And The Private Property Rights Movement

Edited by John Echeverria and Raymond Booth Eby; The Wilderness Society

Island Press, 1995

One of the most serious challenges to environmentalism that has emerged in the 1990s is the so-called Wise Use movement. While operating under the guise of an independent movement of small landowners, it is in reality a backlash against environmental protection measures, funded and organized by corporations with a vested interest in preventing further environmental gains. Let the People Judge collects the writings of a wide range of thinkers on the Wise Use movement and the controversies that fuel the Wise Use debate.

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Listed

Dispatches from America’s Endangered Species Act

Joe Roman

Harvard University Press, 2011

The first listed species to make headlines after the Endangered Species Act was passed in 1973 was the snail darter, a three-inch fish that stood in the way of a massive dam on the Little Tennessee River. When the Supreme Court sided with the darter, Congress changed the rules. The dam was built, the river stopped flowing, and the snail darter went extinct on the Little Tennessee, though it survived in other waterways. A young Al Gore voted for the dam; freshman congressman Newt Gingrich voted for the fish.

A lot has changed since the 1970s, and Joe Roman helps us understand why we should all be happy that this sweeping law is alive and well today. More than a general history of endangered species protection, Listed is a tale of threatened species in the wild—from the whooping crane and North Atlantic right whale to the purple bankclimber, a freshwater mussel tangled up in a water war with Atlanta—and the people working to save them.

Employing methods from the new field of ecological economics, Roman challenges the widely held belief that protecting biodiversity is too costly. And with engaging directness, he explains how preserving biodiversity can help economies and communities thrive. Above all, he shows why the extinction of species matters to us personally—to our health and safety, our prosperity, and our joy in nature.

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Lost Landscapes and Failed Economies

The Search For A Value Of Place

Thomas Michael Power

Island Press, 1996

Over the past two decades, a growing consensus has emerged among Americans as to the importance of environmental quality. Yet at the same time, conflict over environmental issues has built to a point where rational discussion is often impossible. Efforts to protect unique ecosystems and endangered wildlife are portrayed as threatening entire regions and ways of life, and anti-environmental groups such as the Wise Use Movement are able to use economic insecurity as a weapon in an ongoing attempt to rescind environmental protection measures.In Lost Landscapes and Failed Economies, economist Thomas Michael Power argues that the quality of the natural landscape is an essential part of a community's permanent economic base and need not be sacrificed in short-term efforts to maintain employment levels in industries that are ultimately not sustainable. He provides numerous case studies of the ranching, mining, and timber industries in a critical analysis of the role played by extractive industry in our communities. In addition, he looks at areas where environmental protection measures have been enacted and examines the impact of protected landscapes on local economies.Both environmental protection and extractive industry are economic activities that can contribute to local economic well-being. Both generate jobs and income. Both have a significant impact on people's lives. Power exposes the fundamental flaws in the widely accepted view of the local economy built around the "extractive model," a model that overemphasizes the importance of extractive industries and assumes that people don't care where they live and that businesses don't care about the available labor supply. By revealing the inadequacies of the extractive model, he lays to rest fears that environmental protection will cause an imminent collapse of the community, and puts economic tools in the hands of those working to protect their communities.

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