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171 Conclusion t h e฀s i g n i f i c a n c e฀o f฀t h e฀c i t i z e n฀e n v i r o n m e n ta l i s t s฀ f o r฀t h e฀m o d e r n฀e n v i r o n m e n ta l฀m o v e m e n t,฀i n฀ p i t t s b u r g h ’s฀e x p e r i m e n t,฀a n d฀i n฀g a s p The citizen environmentalists were created by a confluence of forces, from the opportunities for public involvement in federal legislation, to the legal philosophy of citizen standing, to the late-1960s support for the idea of participatory democracy. In turn, these activists used the most powerful tools available to them to push their way into the environmental policymaking process. They used not only the emerging ideology of environmentalism but also the language of citizenship, the rhetoric of maternalism, and persuasive claims of scientific expertise. The demographics of their membership connected them to the dense network of women’s civic organizations and the professional authority of men’s academic and technical institutions. They used these tools and capacities to substantively change policy institutions and outcomes. But what, exactly, is the significance of the rise of citizen environmentalism? How can we assess their impact? In short, as I often ask myself and my students, so what? There are three major components to the significance of the citizen environmentalists, including a new understanding of modern environmentalism , the considerably improved environment of Allegheny County, and the persistence and legacy of gasp. ••• There is no doubt among historians of the United States that the last half of the twentieth century witnessed an unprecedented growth in environmental concern. Historians have already presented arguments, quite convincingly, about why and how this occurred. Samuel P. Hays has written that Americans newly free of the economic and military demands of the Great Depression and World War II turned their attention to their own long-delayed prosperity, health, and enjoyment, creating a broad-based, popular movement for the maintenance and enjoyment of high standards of living. Other historians have outlined the emergent philosophies of environmentalism and the political mechanisms that transformed this environmental consciousness into legislative reality. Still others point to the rise 172฀•฀c i t i z e n฀e n v i r o n m e n ta l i s t s in decidedly unnatural and clearly polluting postwar technologies such as the chemical industry, plastics production, and nuclear arms, and the public aversion to those innovations.1 But while the why and how have already been discussed, the significance of the modern environmental movement has not been sufficiently addressed by historians. Beyond the obvious introduction of a new area of political dispute and the popularization of a new philosophy, what is the historical meaning of the rise of environmental thought and action in the last half of the twentieth century? The answer lies not within the environmental movement itself, but rather in the movement’s relationship with contemporaneous events. While all of the concerns of environmental reform had previously appeared in American history—public health, the decay of the city, conservation of wildlands, the alteration of landscape for agricultural purposes, the maintenance or preservation of flora and fauna— what was different about the modern environmental movement was a fundamental change in the relationship between citizens and their government.2 What was different in the 1960s and 1970s was that individuals could use the power of mass media, the tactics of mass protest, the philosophies of individual rights, and a popular belief in individual freedom to agitate for broad social change. In short, the historical significance of the modern environmental movement has less to do with the environment, and more to do with the movement. The environmental movement was a part of a rights revolution, a fundamental redistribution of power from a previously dominant, corporatist governing consensus to a pluralistic, diverse, contentious, and fractious public. The civil rights, women’s liberation, and environmental movements each waged wars to empower the previously excluded individuals and groups they represented. Their battles quite often took place within courtrooms and judicial chambers and revolved around the rights of individuals to take part in a free and open society. The sit-ins...

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