Why did the environmental movements of India fail or succeed?

When the majority of human society feels social stress, it does one of three things—1) accept stress out of a feeling of helplessness, 2) move away from the stressors in the hope that the stress reduces, 3) attempt to reduce the stress or remove the stressor altogether. The third choice is usually the least preferred option as it calls for individual sacrifice and collective effort. But once this choice is made, it turns into a social or a people’s movement, and that brings longer lasting relief and solutions.

To understand the nature of social stress we need to define the environmental and economic spaces that human society operates within, the stresses they have caused and the consequent environmental and social movements that they have triggered.

Read the full piece by Sagar Dhara

Environmental Movements in India by M. Ashraf, Department of History, Patna University, Patna, Bihar