Editing Environmental movement (section)

==== United Kingdom ====
{{See also|Environmental direct action in the United Kingdom|}}
The late 19th century saw the formation of the first wildlife conservation societies. The zoologist [[Alfred Newton]] published a series of investigations into the ''Desirability of establishing a 'Close-time' for the preservation of indigenous animals'' between 1872 and 1903. His advocacy for legislation to protect animals from hunting during the mating season led to the formation of the Plumage League (later the [[Royal Society for the Protection of Birds]]) in 1889.<ref>{{Cite journal |last=Hickling |first=James |date=2021-06-01 |title=The Vera Causa of Endangered Species Legislation: Alfred Newton and the Wild Bird Preservation Acts, 1869–1894 |url=https://doi.org/10.1007/s10739-021-09633-w |journal=Journal of the History of Biology |language=en |volume=54 |issue=2 |pages=275–309 |doi=10.1007/s10739-021-09633-w |issn=1573-0387 |pmid=33782819 |s2cid=254553730|url-access=subscription }}</ref> The society acted as a [[advocacy group|protest group]] campaigning against the use of [[great crested grebe]] and [[black-legged kittiwake|kittiwake]] skins and feathers in [[fur clothing]].<ref>{{Cite news |title=Conservation biology |url=https://www.hmoob.in/wiki/Animal_Conservation |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20230305221019/https://www.hmoob.in/wiki/Animal_Conservation |archive-date=5 March 2023 |access-date=2023-04-08 |website=hmoob.in |language=en}}</ref>{{better source needed|date=April 2023|reason=Source looks like a wikipedia article.}} The Society campaigned for greater protection for the indigenous birds of the [[British Isles|island]].<ref>{{cite web |title=Our History |url=https://www.rspb.org.uk/about-the-rspb/about-us/our-history/ |access-date=28 August 2020 |publisher=RSPB}}</ref> The Society attracted growing support from the suburban middle-classes,<ref>{{Cite journal |last=Mycoo |first=Michelle |date=January 2006 |title=The Retreat of the Upper and Middle Classes to Gated Communities in the Poststructural Adjustment Era: The Case of Trinidad |journal=Environment and Planning A: Economy and Space |language=en |volume=38 |issue=1 |pages=131–148 |bibcode=2006EnPlA..38..131M |doi=10.1068/a37323 |issn=0308-518X |s2cid=143766333}}</ref> and influenced the passage of the [[Sea Birds Preservation Act 1869|Sea Birds Preservation Act]] in 1869 as the first nature protection law in the world.<ref>{{cite book |author=G. Baeyens |url=https://books.google.com/books?isbn=3540740023 |title=Coastal Dunes: Ecology and Conservation |author2=M. L. Martinez |publisher=Springer |year=2007 |page=282}}</ref><ref>{{Cite news |last=Makel |first=Jo |date=2 February 2011 |title=Protecting seabirds at Bempton Cliffs |url=http://news.bbc.co.uk/local/humberside/hi/people_and_places/nature/newsid_9383000/9383787.stm |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20190502175830/http://news.bbc.co.uk/local/humberside/hi/people_and_places/nature/newsid_9383000/9383787.stm |archive-date=2 May 2019 |access-date=16 December 2013 |work=BBC News}}</ref> It also attracted support from many other influential figures, such as the [[ornithologist]] Professor [[Alfred Newton]]. By 1900, public support for the organisation had grown, and it had over 25,000 members. The [[garden city movement]] incorporated many environmental concerns into its [[urban planning]] manifesto; the [[Socialist League (UK, 1885)|Socialist League]] and [[The Clarion (British newspaper)|The Clarion]] movement also began to advocate measures of [[nature conservation]].<ref>Gould, (1988) pp. 16, 23–24, 36–38, 84–86.</ref>

For most of the century from 1850 to 1950, however, the primary environmental cause was the mitigation of air pollution. The [[Environmental Protection UK|Coal Smoke Abatement Society]] was formed in 1898 making it one of the oldest environmental NGOs. It was founded by artist Sir [[William Blake Richmond]], frustrated with the pall cast by coal smoke. Although there were earlier pieces of legislation, the [[Public Health Act 1875]] required all furnaces and fireplaces to consume their own smoke.

[[File:John Ruskin - Portrait - Project Gutenberg eText 17774.jpg|left|thumb|upright|[[John Ruskin]], an influential thinker who articulated the Romantic ideal of environmental protection and conservation]]
Systematic and general efforts on behalf of the environment only began in the late 19th century; it grew out of the amenity movement in Britain in the 1870s, which was a reaction to [[industrialization]], the growth of cities, and worsening air and [[water pollution]]. Starting with the formation of the [[Commons Preservation Society]] in 1865, the movement championed rural preservation against the encroachments of industrialisation. [[Robert Hunter (National Trust)|Robert Hunter]], solicitor for the society, worked with [[Hardwicke Rawnsley]], [[Octavia Hill]], and [[John Ruskin]] to lead a successful campaign to prevent the construction of railways to carry slate from the quarries, which would have ruined the unspoilt valleys of [[Newlands Valley|Newlands]] and [[Ennerdale Water|Ennerdale]]. This success led to the formation of the Lake District Defence Society (later to become The Friends of the Lake District).<ref>{{Cite book |last=Yoshikawa |first=Saeko |title=William Wordsworth and Modern Travel: Railways, Motorcars and the Lake District 1830-1940 |date=2020 |publisher=Oxford University Press |isbn=9781789621181}}</ref><ref name="vc">[http://www.visitcumbria.com/rawnsley.htm "Canon Hardwicke Drummond Rawnsley"] {{webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20140806070246/http://www.visitcumbria.com/rawnsley.htm|date=6 August 2014}}, Visitcumbria.com, accessed 17 May 2009</ref>

In 1893 Hill, Hunter and Rawnsley agreed to set up a national body to coordinate environmental conservation efforts across the country; the "[[National Trust for Places of Historic Interest or Natural Beauty]]" was formally inaugurated in 1894.<ref name="t94">"A Proposed National Trust", ''The Times'', 17 July 1894, p. 12</ref> The organisation obtained secure footing through the 1907 National Trust Bill, which gave the trust the status of a statutory corporation.<ref>"Parliamentary Committees", ''The Times'', 26 July 1907. p. 4</ref> and the bill was passed in August 1907.<ref name="act">[http://www.nationaltrust.org.uk/servlet/file/store5/item740098/version1/National%20Trust%20Acts%201907-1971%20post%20Order%202005.pdf "An Act to incorporate and confer powers upon the National Trust for Places of Historic Interest or Natural Beauty"] {{webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20120602185018/http://www.nationaltrust.org.uk/servlet/file/store5/item740098/version1/National%20Trust%20Acts%201907-1971%20post%20Order%202005.pdf|date=2 June 2012}}, The National Trust. Retrieved 4 June 2012</ref>

Early interest in the environment was a feature of the [[Romantic movement]] in the early 19th century. The poet [[William Wordsworth]] had travelled extensively in England's [[Lake District]] and wrote that it is a "sort of national property in which every man has a right and interest who has an eye to perceive and a heart to enjoy".<ref>{{cite book |last=Wordsworth |first=William |author-link=William Wordsworth |url=https://archive.org/details/bub_gb_idlAAAAAYAAJ |title=A guide through the district of the lakes in the north of England with a description of the scenery, &c. for the use of tourists and residents |publisher=Hudson and Nicholson |year=1835 |edition=5th |location=Kendal, England |page=[https://archive.org/details/bub_gb_idlAAAAAYAAJ/page/n122 88] |quote=sort of national property in which every man has a right and interest who has an eye to perceive and a heart to enjoy.}}</ref><ref>{{Cite web |title=Nature conservation in Britain, ca. 1870–1945 |url=http://www.eh-resources.org/timeline/timeline_conservation.html |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20130122133729/http://www.eh-resources.org/timeline/timeline_conservation.html |archive-date=22 January 2013 |access-date=17 December 2012}}</ref>

An early "Back-to-Nature" movement, which anticipated the romantic ideal of modern environmentalism, was advocated by intellectuals such as [[John Ruskin]], [[William Morris]], [[George Bernard Shaw]] and [[Edward Carpenter]], who were all against [[consumerism]], [[pollution]] and other activities that were harmful to the natural world.<ref name=":2">Gould, Peter C. (1988). ''Early Green Politics'', Brighton, Harvester Press, pgs. 15–19, and [[Derek Wall|Wall, Derek]], (1994) ''Green History: A Reader.'' London, Routledge, pgs. 9–14.</ref> The movement was a reaction to the urban conditions of the industrial towns, where sanitation was awful, pollution levels intolerable and housing terribly cramped.<ref name=":3">{{cite book |last=Marsh |first=Jan |title=Back to the Land: The Pastoral Impulse in England, 1880–1914 |publisher=Quartet Books |year=1982 |isbn=9780704322769}}</ref> Idealists championed the rural life as a mythical [[utopia]] and advocated a return to it. John Ruskin argued that people should return to a "small piece of English ground, beautiful, peaceful, and fruitful. We will have no steam engines upon it ... we will have plenty of flowers and vegetables ... we will have some music and poetry; the children will learn to dance to it and sing it."<ref>{{cite book |author=Jan Marsh |url=https://archive.org/details/backtolandpastor00mars |title=Back to the Land: The Pastoral Impulse in England, 1880–1914 |publisher=Quartet Books |year=1982 |isbn=978-0-7043-2276-9 |url-access=registration}}</ref> Ruskin moved out of London and together with his friends started to think about the [[post-industrial society]]. The predictions Ruskin made for the post-[[coal]] utopia coincided with [[forecasting]] published by the economist [[William Stanley Jevons]].<ref>{{cite book |title=Historicism and the Human Sciences in Victorian Britain |publisher=Cambridge University Press |year=2017 |isbn=9781316738948 |editor1=Mark Bevir |page=186}}</ref> Practical ventures in the establishment of small cooperative farms were even attempted and old rural traditions, without the "taint of manufacture or the canker of artificiality", were enthusiastically revived, including the [[Morris dance]] and the [[maypole]].<ref>{{Cite journal |date=15 December 1983 |title='Back to nature' movement nothing new – dates back to 1880 |url=http://www.csmonitor.com/1983/1215/121523.html |url-status=live |journal=The Christian Science Monitor |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20131216182555/http://www.csmonitor.com/1983/1215/121523.html |archive-date=16 December 2013 |access-date=17 December 2012}}</ref>

The Coal Smoke Abatement Society (now [[Environmental Protection UK]]) was formed in 1898 making it one of the oldest environmental NGOs. It was founded by artist Sir [[William Blake Richmond]], frustrated with the pall cast by coal smoke. Although there were earlier pieces of legislation, the [[Public Health Act 1875]] required all furnaces and fireplaces to consume their own smoke. It also provided for sanctions against factories that emitted large amounts of black smoke. This law's provisions were extended in 1926 with the Smoke Abatement Act to include other emissions, such as soot, ash, and gritty particles, and to empower local authorities to impose their own regulations.

It was only under the impetus of the [[Great Smog]] of 1952 in London, which almost brought the city to a standstill and may have caused upward of 6,000 deaths, that the [[Clean Air Act 1956]] was passed and airborne pollution in the city was first tackled. Financial incentives were offered to householders to replace open coal fires with alternatives (such as installing gas fires) or those who preferred, to burn coke instead (a byproduct of town gas production) which produces minimal smoke. 'Smoke control areas' were introduced in some towns and cities where only smokeless fuels could be burnt and power stations were relocated away from cities. The act formed an important impetus to modern environmentalism and caused a rethinking of the dangers of environmental degradation to people's quality of life.<ref>{{Cite web |date=10 December 2012 |title=London's Great Smog, 60 Years On |url=http://activehistory.ca/2012/12/londons-great-smog-60-years-on/ |access-date=17 December 2012}}</ref>