ENV22850

This course will study the most pressing issues of global, ecological, and sociological relevance within the environmental fields and explore the root causes of our current state of the world. We will question how and why the diversity of environmental philosophies have simultaneously broadened and weakened the collaborative capacity of the environmental movement. Topics include the life-giving services that nature provides and how and why the field of economics fails to account for those services in their decision making. The course will cover international legislative actions from the 1970s to the present to explain why the US lost its standing as environmental leader. The successes and failures of international response to global environmental issues will be contrasted. The course will analyze controversial solutions in the international mainstream (e.g., globalization, sustainable development, and industrialized agriculture) and consider alternatives. A study of ancient civilizations will focus on choices that led to collapse. Naturally, discussion will focus on involvement of the U.S. both domestically and internationally, and how our unique culture may be our undoing… or our salvation.SPECIAL NOTES: N/A