Backlash Against Environmentalism in the United States

Scholarly attention to the history of environmentalism often relegates opponents of environmental protection as foils, relevant only in relation to their efforts to undermine efforts to advance environmental protection and strengthen the regulatory state. However, a growing body of scholarship has given attention to opponents of modern environmentalism, considering their motivations, strategies, and goals across specific issues, from public lands and climate change, and constituencies, such as conservatives or evangelical Christians. Much of this scholarship focuses on the United States. Rather than casting environmental opponents as reactionaries, this literature considers how opponents of environmental reform have exemplified and contributed to broader shifts in US politics. As conservatives have gained political power since the 1960s, environmental issues have evolved, and national political discourse has become increasingly polarized. Environmental opponents have organized in response to regional issues, such as management of public lands in the West, challenged the scale and scope of national regulations aimed at addressing air and water pollution, and questioned the validity of environmental science underpinning issues ranging from lead exposure to climate change. In advancing this agenda, the environmental opposition has often emphasized the value of economic growth, questioned the effectiveness and efficiency of the regulatory state, and championed a culture of abundance that prioritizes resource extraction. Although, in some cases, opposition has been spearheaded by corporate interests, the literature makes clear that the environmental opposition cannot be dismissed simply as a cover for corporations or rooted solely in economic concerns. In many cases, the work of individuals and organizations stems from deep-seated values that run counter to those of environmentalists. This scholarship can be organized into subcategories that focus on (1) public lands, Sagebrush Rebellion, and the Wise Use movement; (2) conservatives and the environment; (3) corporate anti-environmentalism; (4) climate change denial; and (5) evangelical Christians. Opposition to modern environmentalism and the environmental regulatory state have also emerged from the political left, as seen in the work of environmental justice advocates and degrowth thinkers, among others. These currents of opposition to environmentalism are covered elsewhere in Oxford Bibliographies in Environmental History.