journal of Environrnental Psychology (1993) 13, 173-182 0272-4944/93/020173+10508,00/0 © 1993 Academic Press Ltd

PSYCHOLOGY REVIEW ESSAY

E N V I R O N M E N T A L VALUES A N D THE S E A R C H F O R A G LOBAL ETHIC

ROBERT N. RAPOPORT

Institute of Family and Environmental Research, 7a Kidderpore Avenue, London NW3 7SX, U.K.

Robert Rapoport is co-Director of the Institute of Family & Environmental Research and author~co-author of books and papers including Leisure and the Family Life Cycle, and New Interventions for Children and Youth: Action-Research Approaches.

This essay is based on a non-systematic assortment or recent works on the environment. Taken collectively they show two things: first, that the environmental challenge is formidable enough to elicit contributions from every imaginable corner of the concerned scholarly world; and second, that across this wide range of works a common concern seems to be emerging. I suggest that there i sa very widespread urge for a new global ethic which will unite people in the kind of moral community which is capable of dealing with the current environmental crisis. This urge for a new global ethic is salient for environmentalists, but may also have relevance for the larger human predicament.

The books overlap considerably, and it would be tedious if not futile to try to assign locations for each particular idea. I therefore present present a vignette of each of the books, followed by a narrative recounting of the message they collectively convey to me. If the sporadic mentions of particular authors slights others who have expressed similar views, I apologize. There is a strong sense of the transcendant value of co-operative effort expressed in many of these books, as we travel hopefully on a shared and currently very risky journey through life.

The books on which this review essay is mainly based are:

Sustainable Development of the Biosphere. Edited by W. C. Clark and R. E. Munn. Laxenberg, Austria: Cambridge University Press for the International Institute for Applied Systems Analysis, 1986. 491 pp. ISBN: 0 521 32369 X.

This is a multidisciplinary collection of papers edited by two Canadian scientists heading a 16-nations team constituting a network institute with headquarters in Austria. The dominant contributors are natural scientists, with outstanding (if sporadically, a little dated by now) presentations of the best available data on the condition of the biosphere and suggested approaches to its possible sustentation.

Ethics and Environmental Responsibility. Edited by Nigel Dower. Aldershot: Avebury/Gower, 1989. 146 pp. ISBN: 0 566 5764 6.

This is a collection of papers by six Anglo (British, Australian and American) philosophers, who examine ethical dimensions of the new concern for the environment, asking whether contemporary environmental ethics is covered by traditional philosQphical bases, or whether there are new elements in the contemporary quest for an environmental ethic.

Wealth Beyond Measure. By Paul Ekins, Mayer Hillman and Robert Hutchison. London: Gala Books, 1992. 191 pp. ISBN: 1 85675 7.

This is a book by a group of committed environmental activists advocating a 'new economics' in which conventional capitalists goals of productivity must be put into perspective with other values~for the eventual wider benefit of all humanity.

Preparing for the 21st Century. By Paul Kennedy. London: Harper Collins, 1993. 428 pp. ISBN: 0 00 215705 5. This is a book by the author of the Rise and Fall of Great Powers, identifying three impending crises for the world--

one of them environmental (the others, demographic and technological). The author advocates urgent action at the macro-political/economic level to try to avert global disaster.

The First Global Revolution. By Alexander King and Bertrand Schneider. London: Simon and Schuster, 1991. 197 PP. ISBN: 0 671 71094 N.

This a book by two of the leading figures in the Club of Rome, a global thinktank network which has produced or stimulated a series of seminal if sometimes controversial works on the environment--notably Meadows' The Limits of Growth. In the current volume, the authors assert that the resolution of the complex of global problems will require attention to shared values and the development of a new global ethic. This should grow out of existing values systems rather than being imposed.

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Millenium. By David Maybury-Lewis. London: Viking, 1992.397 pp. ISBN: 0 670 82935 8. A glorious coffee-table production linked to a BBC film series on the wisdom of tribal cultures, this book should not

be brushed aside as merely an elegant popularization. A mixture of autobiography (Maybury-Lewis is an anthro. pologist in the heroic tradition--part adventurer, part naturalist), anthropological textbook, and an impassioned plea for conservation of tribal societies. Maybury-Lewis and his colleagues/sponsors argue that assuring the survival of small vulnerable tribal groups is imperative not only on humanistic grounds but because they may contribute to global culture and to the healing arts.

The Voice of the Earth: A Exploration of Ecopsychology. By Theodore Roszack. London: Bantam/Transworld, 1993.368 pp. ISBN: 0 593 02816 3.

Roszack made his reputation as a sensitive social-psychological analyst in his The Making of a Counterculture in the 1960s. In the present book he calls for a new relationship with nature, with psychology offering a corrective for the collective madness of humanity in destroying the habitat on which its existence is based. The name he gives the new psychology is, cutely, 'ecopsychology'.

Global Environmenta l Change: The H u m a n Dimensions. Edited by Paul Stern, Oran R. Young and Daniel Druckman. Washington, D.C.: The National Academy Press, 1992.308 pp. ISBN: 0 309 04632 7.

This is the results of the blue-ribbon interdisciplinary team set up by the American National Science Foundation to explore the 'human dimension' of environmental change and to make recommendations. In this context, the recom- mendations made, for example, for establishing multidisciplinary centres of excellence meshing human and natural science research are not to be taken as empire-building, but as indications of the need for explication of the potential contributions of psychology. Some of the collateral publications of Stern and his colleagues substantiate this theme.

The eight books indicated above have very different styles reflecting the diverse sciences currently turn- ing their at tention to ecological issues. By focusing on the element of convergence on values issues and the search for a new ethic, I necessarily slight other issues of concern to some or all of them. However, a discussion of the ethical dimension of the con- temporary discourse may be salutary, hopefully complementing reviews focusing on other aspects of this multifacetted topic.

My discussion raises three key questions:

(1) Is sustainable development of the biosphere possible?

(2) What human action might be effective toward this goal?

(3) What is the part played by values and is there a search for a new Global Ethic?

Susta inable D e v e l o p m e n t o f the B iosphere

By the mid-1980s it became more widely accepted than previously tha t there is a factual basis for perceiving a global environmental crisis from which there is no local escape. A series of heavyweight publications including the Club of Rome's Limits of Growth (Meadows et al., 1972), made it clear tha t the fears and anxieties of naturalists and earth- watch conservationists should be taken seriously by everyone. Sound scientific evidence has indicated tha t the degradation of the environment, result- ing from combinations of callous exploitation and unintended consequences of otherwise beneficial

pursuits, has reached an unprecedented situation where the capacity of the biosphere to sustain human life may really be irretrievably impaired. Environmental conservation is not simply a social movement of cranky doomsayers.

Macro-analyses covering vast reaches of time and space had sometimes been taken to imply that the contemporary predicament is jus t another episode in earth history, part of a natura l extravaganza of continental movements, glacial advances and retreats, and the evolution and extinction of species. But, valid as this construction of ear th history may be, it does not gainsay the potentially calamitous nature of the current crisis for humanity. The recent acceleration of population growth, made possible by effective exploitation of environmental resources, has overburdened and damaged the earth. The collateral acceleration of technological developments needed to support the population growth with their escalating needs and wants has created a vicious spiral. We have only now come to the realization tha t the biosphere cannot simply absorb the wastes, pollutants and distortions of function being thrust onto it, but that a fundamental t ransformat ion is taking place and therefore radical action is required.

The new wider appreciation of the gravity of global issues--emerged from a series of international Commissions producing works which increased public consciousness of how contemporary global crises are linked. First, the problem of security with its high costs and barriers to global cooperation, was addressed in the Palme Commission; second, economic issues of the disparity in wealth and growth

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potential as between the developed 'northern' countries and the developing 'southern' countries was addressed in The Brandt Commission. Finally, there was the Brundtland Commission, whose Report in 1987 sought to integrate the apparently conflicting requirements of economic development with those of environmental conservation with the concept of sustainable development.

Initially, some of those who defended a non-inter- ventionist position, argued that the focus of concern should be on pre-industrial groups for all sorts of reasons. Stereotypically it was considered that it is they who are inefficient in their technology for exploiting the earth and in their attention to con- servation, and it is they who are thrust ing upon the world an unmanageable population explosion. Whatever the merits and deficiencies of this argu- ment, it is clear that in the contemporary world the developed countries contribute far more to environ- mental degradation than do the less developed portions of the world, despite their greater numbers and their inefficient technology. For sustain- able development, both developed and developing countries are being called upon to recognize the mutually destructive effects of their different but equally destructive assaults on the earth as a whole.

Findings, now widely available on 'greenhouse gases and climate change', 'chlorofluorocarbons and the thinning of the stratospheric ozone layer', and 'deforestation and the loss of biological diversity', have detailed precisely how this degradation has proceeded. The scientific findings and the issues they raise have now come into the discourse of governments and concerned individuals and action groups.

Is the environmental damage irreversible? The answer seems to be 'No-one knows. Maybe'. There are pessimists and optimists. Clark & Munn distin- guish between 'conservationists' (who regard the current threat as an aberration who hope that nature can take over with natural reparative func- tions which will restore previous conditions), and 'possibilists' (who consider that the only possible way to be effective in sustaining the development of the biosphere is for humans to take active control and devise new interventions). The first group use a horticultural metaphor, 'Earth as Garden'; the second, a technological metaphor, 'Spaceship Earth'.

By the late 1980s, even the most blas~ of earth- Watchers were prepared to admit that there was no protection in concentrating only on one's local interests. Forward thinking people were asking Whether the environmental degradation scenario Was not as frightening as the nuclear war scen-

ario that had dominated political consciousness in developed nations until that time. For vulnerable groups the urgency was seen to be even greater as the juggernauts of callous environmental exploita- tion slowed but did not quite stop under the impact of early protective legislation. To some extent the tribes are emblematic of the predicament of the human race. Helping the tribe to survive will help humanity at large in more ways than one: as a metaphor for the human race, as a brake on rampant rainforest destruction, as a tutorial for nature-alienated mankind seeking a new relation- ship with nature.

The concept of vertical integration seems to have some relevance in the current situation. To local people 'vertical' previously meant domination and exploitation by a sequence of powerful people-- feudal lords, colonial settlers, capitalist industrialists, or by newly empowered and almost as rapidly cor- rupted dictators. This history does not contradict the need for integration between local and larger- scale systems, and a degree of vertical integration can be protective. In the words of Sheila Harden, 'small is dangerous'. Small scale locals need to develop larger- scale networks for information and mutual aid as well as their grass-roots competence and self- efficacy. Those at the top need to articulate their efforts with the locals, or their promulgations, how- ever well-meaning, will be ineffectual in the long run.

On the private sector side, there are multinational business organizations whose wealth and power globally are comparable in scope to those of medium size nations. They are being encouraged to concern themselves more with the impact of their produc- tion processes on the communities in which they operate, from local to global and for both moral and utili tarian reasons. Companies that pollute water- ways and the atmosphere are not only committing villainous acts which will harm their image and morale, but in the current cirumstances are likely to be severely regulated if not run out of business. Private investment in 'ethical' companies has shown an increase in volume, reflecting community support for the ethical approach to business and industry, and their profitability may reflect the economic as well as moral value of environmentally responsible industry.

W h a t K i n d s o f A c t i v i t i e s w i l l b e Ef fec t ive?

In answer to the question 'What should be done?', the answer seems to be 'Everything we can think of'. The array of books mentioned above, which is by

176 R .N . Rapoport

no means complete, are contributions from a wide range of disciplines from all parts of the world, and included suggestions for both action and research.

As it is unknowable whether any human interven- tion will be effective in reversing the damage that has been done, it is interesting to observe what the human animal does when it perceives the possi- bility of its own extinction. We know more than any other creature could ever have known about what factors have produced this situation; but whether we know enough to get us out of this predicament remains to be seen.

J. E. Lovelock (in Clark & Munn, p. 212) likens our relationship with the earth to that between the 18th-century physician and his patients. 'We share with him a vast ignorance illuminated only by instinct that warns us not to act precipitately, for such action is potentially as disastrous as inaction'. Lovelock advocates slow trial and error and the use of local knowledge. As a basis for this he notes that the medieval farmer kept a balanced ecosystem going around his farm based on local knowledge rather than ecosystem theory. The trial and error method of local interventions may be as effective as if they had been science-guided. The story of the Romans' conquest of malaria by draining the swamps is an example. Their reasons for draining the swamps were based on the theory that malaria was t ransmit ted via the smelly swamp air. But Anita Roddick's assertion in the introduction to Millenium that shamans differ from modern doctors in not only treating the symptom but wanting to know the cause is naive and misleading. Tribal culture should be conserved out of humanist consid- erations, whether or not they earn their right to survive by what they have to contribute to the world's clinical knowledge (which may be even further off the mark than tile Romans were).

In the modern context there are two streams of recommendations--one for action, the other for research. Ideally these should be interconnected. However, each s tream has a life of its own and there are both convergent and divergent tendencies in each.

The action agenda are familiar enough that I can merely mention them in outline here.

- - a t the level of global institutions there is the huge and complex agenda associated with the UN-sponsored Ear th Summit.

- - a t the level of regions and states, there are activities associated with governmental agen- cies, such as the Ministry of the Environment in Britain and the European Commission's Environment Agency.

- - a t local levels, there are local government pro-

grammes, for example, for waste management and conservation of energy and of natural re. sources. Individuals participate through changes in life style in the direction of recommendations conveyed through the media etc. There are als0 the activities of voluntary non-governmental groups, many of them parts of international social movements, for example, the 'Green Movement'. This is a somewhat heterogeneous grouiy--ranging from the highly doctrinaire and politicized flank (as in the Green Party in Germany) to groups more orientated to the translation of science-based research into policy formulations, for example, The Green Alliance, the Club of Rome, and the Gala Foundation.

Focusing on the research agenda, aside from the ubiquitous academic call for more research, there is the important thrust by the National Research Council Committee to find ways of incorporating a human-sciences dimension into natural science research programmes. This may be whistling in the dark, but Stern and his colleagues lay out the logic of what governments, foundations and other patrons of the research enterprise should do if they accept that the human dimension is important. Their arsenal includes the underwrit ing of centres of excellence for advanced multidisciplinary research, endowed chairs, special journal issues, conferences and lecture series, and specialist training pro- grammes. They recommend a careful s tudy of the best use of available resources and how to encour- age public and private partnership for the support of relevant research.

Substantively, the National Research Council group suggest that priority be given to research on anthropogenic sources of global change (particularly in relation to the interaction of different forces conventionally studied in isolation by the different disciplines); on studies of phenomena at different levels of social structure (local, national, regional); on longer t ime-span phenomena than has generally been in focus in the human sciences; on different intervention approaches; on different ways of influencing human behaviour, and on differences in the robustness of systems involved.

In separate publications Stern has amplified the special relevance of these developments for psy- chology as a discipline, and the contribution that psychologists in particular may make to the pro- cess. In his 1992 paper in the Annual Review of Psychology he indicates some of the issues involved in refraining existing work to fit the global change focus (Stern, 1992). Research on perception and judgement, on risk assessment, on att i tude and

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behavioural change, on communications, motivation, social control, on organizational participation are potentially relevant. There is a need for more knowledge and expertise of the kind that psycholo- gists can contribute to evaluation of inventions, on resource mobilization and conflict management. Stern also emphasizes the relevance of values and research on values.

Given the global span of the topic, this kind of programme should be linked to the encouragement of partnerships and other co-operative structures for linking the work of scholars in different parts of the world. Clark, whose team is doing just this, outlines a programme for research starting with a charting of (chemically) valuable atmospheric com- ponents which are being degraded. Examples are the absorption of ultraviolet solar radiation on the one side, and the alteration of thermal radiation by infra-red energy from the Earth. Against this, he posits sources of disturbance of the atmospheric components (such as the characteristics and func- tioning of oceans and estuaries, vegetation and soils, animal life and human activities such as industries and waste-disposal). The analysis of effects of human interaction with the biosphere is approached by Crutzen and Graedel through the construction of a matrix. On one axis is the human dimension, encompassed in the growth of the modern world system as schematized by Wallerstein and others (Wallerstein, 1974; Chisholm, 1982; Bradel, 1984). Eleven points are salient:

1. Worldwide expansion of the European frontier. 2. World population growth from 641 million

estimated for 1700 to 4435 million for 1980. 3. A dramatic growth in the population of cities. 4. Increased use of fossil fuels and hydroelectric

power associated with the revolutionary de- velopment of transport, communications, and industrial production.

5. Development of Scientific methods, institutions and technical means for research and discovery in the biological and physical sciences.

6. Development of new weaponry capable of near- global destruction.

7. Dramatic advances in our ability to cure illness and control the spread of disease.

8. Growth in scale and efficiency of organiza- tions.

9. Emergence of self-regulating markets for goods and services.

10. Emergence of world division of labour between the developed (northern, or core) industrial countries and the developing (Southern, or peripheral) countries.

11. Expansion of sedentary agriculture and com- pression of peoples engaged in shifting agricul- ture or nomadism.

On the other axis are indicators of biosphere change. The matrix display of interaction between biosphere change and human development helps to clarify the parameters for a research programme. However, while forecasts which extrapolate rela- tively mechanistically from charted patterns have a certain appeal, their 'surprise free' character fails to approximate probable reality. Even so, accepting it only as a rough guide we are left with a situation of incomplete knowledge and a dear th of precedents. Formulating action and policy on the basis of such a schema is more likely to be effective if supple- mented by a variety of additional measures than simple extrapolation: Harvey Brooks has suggested a deliberate future-guessing fame, imaging all sorts of improbable eventualities. Donald Michael, Edgar Schein and others suggest that planning be seen as an action-learning process. A variety of new tech- niques are being used to lay out possible surprises, many of them requiring the synthesis of large volumes of data and ideas.

Ravetz and Brewer, in two papers in the Clark and Munn book, discuss approaches to making such syntheses. One approach, the Blue Ribbon Panel of experts, is a widely used method. The National Research Council Commission itself is an example. The method has important l imitations--including competing demands on members ' t ime and the influence of group dynamics processes ra ther than data or other objective considerations in shaping judgements. A review of actual Blue Ribbon Groups (e.g. in the analysis of desertification) supports the view that where there is scientific uncertainty to- gether with political pressure the method is vulner- able to extraneous processes.

A second approach is Formal Modeling. This too has advantages and risks. The advantages are in the capacity to handle enormous amounts of data through computer analysis; the case against the method is its lack of multidimensionality, its vulner- ability to inputs of mixed quality data, and its lack of ability to question its own assumptions.

Games theory, or Political Gaming is another potentially useful method. Initially associated with strategic planning during the 'Cold War' period of the 1950s and early 1960s, this method used groups of humans (rather than computers) to develop realistic scenarios and also possible reactions of opponents. The team is required to work through responses both to the scenarios and to the other teams moves. Though the method has potential for

178 R .N. Rapoport

confronting and learning how to cope with potential interactions between development and environ- ment, like other approaches it has l imitat ions--i t is time-consuming, relies on skilled preparation and facilitation, and may suffer from shortcomings in relation to review and evaluation, a particularly vulnerable point where there are political dimesions.

There, has been a shift amongst afficionados of this approach toward 'policy exercises' based on the construction of 'future histories'. Microcomputers are used along with group discussions to counteract the shortcomings of each method while maximizing their advantages. Clark aims to refine this method through the development of a series of possible future histories of sustainable biosphere develop- ment. Using the Ear th as Garden metaphor, it will focus on defining the kind of garden people want to improve human well-being while assuring that the improvements are ecologically sustainable on a global scale. This is seen ideally as a long-term exercise, with meetings every few years to assess the extent to which the scenarios for the develop- ment of envi ronment-human interaction pat terns have reflected reality. Where they have not, the scenarios would be revised as appropriate. This approach incorporates surprises and corrects mis- assessments of t ime-spans and other such errors, thus improving perspectives on the actual processes of interaction between human processes and environ- mental conditions.

There is a great deal of variation in at t i tudes about the utility of doing visioning exercises, partic- ularly if their goal is to reduce the gap between experience and vision. Some of the earth scientists regard the role of humans as relatively puny compared with the great forces of nature and the vast reaches of geological time, so the idea that visioning a future will help to bring it about seems grandiose. On the other hand, a totally fatalistic orientation seems to belong more with religion than science where a heroic engineering orientation is more congenial. The social engineering orientation seeks to make humans reverse their villainous role as perpetrators of so many calamitous anthro- pogenic effects on the earth and to set things right with the biosphere, spare no expense or effort.

None of the books reviewed advocate reliance on supernatural powers to bring about the salvation of the biosphere, but several of them suggest the need for new orientations, often with a 'spiritual' cast. l~oszack's 'ecopsychology' borders on this orienta- tion. Ekins and his colleagues (with their call for a 'new economics') and King & Schneider's (with their call for a new global ethic) seek to combine

elements of hard headed geopolitical economics wi th attention to moral and spiritual values.

S o c i a l V a l u e s a n d t h e S e a r c h for a G l o b a l E t h i c

A chronic issue in the social sciences concerns the place of values in social theory and methodology. The concept of values is a slippery one, with a wide range of demotic and technical usages. Many social scientists consider it too vague and amorphous to be useful.

Historically, the sociological use of the concept reached prominence in the 1950s and 1960s where it was associated with Parsonian total systems analysis. Values were seen as the crucial cement holding social systems together. Following the move away from that kind of holistic analysis the concept of values has been used 0nly in the analysis of part- systems, as for example, in the socialization studies of Melvin Kohn where social class values were shown to be associated with parental methods of discipline. Holistic studies of the 'world system' by Immanuel Wallerstein and his colleagues have not made prominent use of the values concept which is incompatible with their economic determinist position.

In anthropology, following the burs t of interest in the 1950s and 1960s associated with Clyde Kluckhohn's work in the American Southwest the concept fell into semi-disuse. This was partly due to Kluckhohn's premature death and the difficulties in realizing the fruits of this visionary project, and partly it was associated with the paradigm shifts to part-systems analysis in 'post-modernist ' anthro- pology. To the extent that the concept has been used at all in subsequent decades, it is assimilated into cultural analysis where it is used, though not systematically, in the work of only a few anthro- pologists like Mary Douglas and her associates and Pierre Bourdieu.

In psychology, value orientations have been studied by a number of people from Rokeach down to Inglehart and Shalom Schwartz. A preliminary understanding of the relevance of values for environ- mental action is seen in the way value orientations are embedded in general orientations to the Earth. Stern identifies:

the New Environmental Paradigm (NEP) based on the perception that there is a delicate balance in the natural environment, and human concern can have a critical effect

Anthropocentric altruism, based on the 'golden

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rule' conception tha t action toward others (includ- ing the environment) should be guided by its implications for humani ty

Egoism, based on the assumption that people are primarily motivated by utili tarian concerns, assessing personal risks in terms of costs and benefits of particular actions

and Deep cause concern, based on perceptions of ultimate (Rokeach, 'terminal') values which may be religious in character or may be felt to express ineluctable social forces such as Inglehart's post-materialist cultural change.

The different conceptual models vary in sys- tematization and in how much linkage has' been demonstrated between the specific concepts and environmentally relevant behaviour. The strand of values research perhaps most articulated to the current concerns of environmentalists is that of S. H. Schwartz and his associates. Their key concept is 'norm-activation'. Schwartz's theory treats concern with the environment as a form of altruism in that the key concern is with the well-being of other humans. There are now a string of studies focusing on the relationship between explicating this norm and altering specific behaviours--li t ter- ing, use of lead-free petrol, energy conservation, pollution of the environment through burning refuse, recycling, rejection of aerosols, etc. In general they provide empirical support for the hypothesis. Stern has contributed to this by show- ing that environmentally responsible behaviour reflects a trade-off between egoistic and altruistic motivations. Environmentally responsible behaviour is a resultant of three value orientations: the egoistic, the humanistic/altruistic, and the concern with the biosphere of non-human life on the planet. There is a s t ream of work stemming from Rokeach, which has given rise to a very productive set of cross-cultural studies of values mentioned above. Aside from the work of Inglehart and Shalom Schwartz, the relevance of these studies to environ- mental issues has yet to be explored.

Philosophers, who have always had an interest in ethics and values (and, indeed, were partners with anthropologists in the Harvard values-project initiated by Kluckhohn) have not until recently articulated with social scientist in the analysis of values (though there are notable exceptions, like Bernard Williams, A. J. Ayer and Charles Taylor). They have now begun to participate in the inter- disciplinary dialogue, as seen in the new publication series on Studies in Culture and Values, published by the Council for Research in Values and Philosophy (edited by George F. McLean). In his context, the

work of Nigel Dower and his colleagues is the most relevant to those concerned with environmental issues. I shall re turn to this later.

In many cases, of which Paul Kennedy's book is an example, important thinkers do not use the concept explicitly but it nevertheless plays a covert part in their analysis. Kennedy does not make explicit systematic reference to value orientations, as indicated by the absence in his subject index of 'ethics', 'values or 'morals'. Nor does he seem concerned in any serious way with gender issues, other than in the demographic frame. There is plenty under 'women', and his solution to the new Malthusian problem pays a great deal of attention to the importance of educating and finding employ- ment for women in the developing countries. This is not espoused out of a positive valuation of gender equity, but because this will be associated with a drop in the birth rate. The power of his analysis reminds us that values alone have variable power as determinants of social action. Sometimes a valued outcome from one point of view is achieved through the conjoint operation of another va lue-- sometimes even wrong-headedly as in the early American early endorsement of the franchise for women on the assumption that they would vote Republican. A more effective approach to the analysis of values and social action should incorporate a consideration of interests as well.

Value orientations underpinning a particular form of collective behaviour may derive from different sources. For example, similar conservationist atti tudes may be found in post-Chernobyl Ukrainia to those expressed by Americans holding to the New Environmental Paradigm. Furthermore, a given value orientation may be associated with diverse behaviours. For example, individuals with egoistic value orientations may assess the costs and benefits of pro-environmental behaviour differently and respond differently accordingly.

In the branches of psychology associated with clinical perspectives, there has been a certain amount of interest in values, for example, in the concept of 'values clarification' as used in psycho- therapy. Some of the Tavistock Institute work, applying psychodynamic concepts to social and organizational analysis has made use of the con- cept. In the mid-1960s, Emery & Trist began a series of prescient papers on fundamental shifts in what they called the social ecology of organizations. In their 1965 paper on 'the causal texture of the environment ' they called for a focus on values as concepts capable of integrating diverse elements in turbulent social fields to meet emerging challenges.

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Mark Cantley, in the Clark & Munn book (p. 349), quotes Emery & Trist's paper as prescient for modern bio-ecologists, and notes how closely it corresponds to the contemporary analysis of the eminent physicist/technologist Harvey Brooks. Brooks observes that 'we are in the midst of a very painful transition to a single interdependent global community in which it should be increasingly apparent that the benefits of cooperation to all its interdependent parts exceed (those of) rivalry' (p. 340). Cantley concurs that given the high degree of instability and uncertainty accompanying contemporary social turbulence and conflict, the kinds of values we need to emphasize are those of co-operation.

The Dower book, by contrast with earlier philo- sophical approaches, is less concerned with historical and classificatory tasks in relation to contemporary approaches to the environment and more con- cerned with practical applications of concepts of the good and of ethical principles for achieving them. Amongst other aspects of this kind of analysis, it has potential utility in the work of anticipating unintended consequences of action. Beyond that, it focuses particularly on increasing our understand- ing of conditions under which humans will accept responsibility for their actions. Though there is little cross-cultural referencing in this book, it is assumed that the perspectives of these philoso- phers are shared globally. The doctrine of ethical relativism is acknowledged as presenting certain problems, but it is argued that the advantages of adopting a universal set of moral rules or principles for regulating life in the complex situation facing the world are preferable to their rejection. There- fore, while there is respect for different systems of ethical thought, a way will have to be found to transcend narrow local interests in which they are embedded.

The UN is already applying widely accepted values such as justice, humanity and respect for human rights to some extent across the political boundaries in the UN. The task ahead is to make more specific translations of globally applicable ethical principles into local idioms. Dower and his colleagues examine a number of specific areas in connection with this task--animal rights, nuclear risks, and political dynamics--and argue that a new global ethic will have to cover three dimensions:

(a) humanity as a whole--through the extension of humanistic values to human beings every- where in the world (not simply myself, my family, neighbourhood, ethnic group, or nation).

(b)

(c)

the future--by being concerned with sustain. ability and long-term planning; and all life--in the entire ecosystem including wilderness, plant and animal life, and small. scale human societies. There are of course many problems of definition, evaluation of competing theories, resolutions of conflicting conceptions of rights, duties, obligations, etc., but the basic principles underlying biodiver- sity are accepted and spelled out in terms of ethical values.

The importance of disciplined analysis of ideas and conceptual positions as they relate to pressing real-life problems is thus persuasively affirmed. Until very recently, there has been a greater call for attention to values in the world of action than in the academic world. Businessmen concerned with global enterprises, religious leaders concerned with the dwindling of popular concern with spiritual values, politicians concerned with social reconstruction following the demise of the defunct ideologies--have all been calling for a renewed attention to the analysis of values. The global environmental crisis seems to have provided a spur to renewing an interest in this line of conceptualization in the social science world. Joining with studies of the globalization process itself, there is a new pre- occupation, crosscutting the action/academic divide, with the search for a new global ethic. Stern and his colleagues note that environmental changes matter to people everywhere because of the potential for events in any part of the world have to harm what people value. The European Environment Agency has published an attractive brochure entitled Pollu- tion Knows no Frontiers. The need to consider global values is implied in the effort to build the basis for co-operation required to meet the challenge. Measures needed to be taken in relation to the cluster of phenomena we have been calling the environmental challenge are very diverse, ranging from automobile emissions, domestic consumer patterns, nuclear energy policies, etc. These vary from place to place and have different values attached to them, so any code of conductksystem of ethics-- must combine firmness with flexibility. Psycholo- gists are concerned with identifying the kind of motivation (what Schwartz calls 'norm-activation') that will be effective in this situation. Codes of ethics have been part of the impedimenta of profes- sions, and one sees the growth of ethics programmes in universities--in the Environment field (Oxford), in Business (Warwick), in Politics (Princeton) as well as in the traditional training programmes for the medical, legal and social service professions

Review Essay 181

(including clinical psychology). In America there is a growing Association for Practical and Professional Ethics. In the public domain there is increased concern with the monitoring of ethical practices in various spheres--nature/conservation, life/genetic engineering, heal th research, economic develop- ment, money, advertising and journalism, media imagery, and of international relations.

However, the development of a global 'ethic', as a system of cultural values motivating peoples' behaviour o n a widespread basis (as with the 'Protestant Ethic') is another, more complex and less explored matter . Yet this is what is being called for by King and Schneider. It is not at all clear what system of global values will emerge as internally coherent and universally acceptable. Each of the the major world religions can meet the first crite- rion, but none meet the second, though some aspire to it. The United Nations Convention of Human Rights does not quite meet either completely, and its relation to other value systems needs explo- ration. Specific principles--such as the 'equity principle', 'freedom of expression', '(parliamentary) democracy', 'harmony', 'diversity', 'happiness', 'love', 'beauty', 'justice', 'co-operation', 'solidarity', have their merits and partisans, particularly as applied to specific areas of life. But none of them form the basis for a coherent moral order, nor do they find universal endorsement. Gender equity, for example, is rejected as a principle in many parts of the world, and its ~link to other principles--such as a love and harmony--is uncertain.

There are fur ther complexities. Social conflict, which generally interferes with the achievement of co-operative efforts to establish a global values system, may occur not so much out of contrasts in values as out of divergent interpretations or different interests in a situation. Jews and Muslims in the Middle East differ less in their value orien- tations than in geo-political interests; and the same may be said of Greeks and Turks in Cyprus, Protestants and Catholics in the North of Ireland, and Hindus and Muslims in India (where the critical contrast in the larger context is between sacred and secular orientations).

Furthermore, there are many in all parts of the world whose values are antithetical to the kinds of values that guide the quest for a new global ethic. The global gangsters who seek to promote illegal selfish interests, mafias, ethnic cleansers, fascist ideologues and the alienated or deranged fringe groups (like the Branch Davidians and other cult groups). How can these conundrums be approached?

In the concluding sections of King and Schneider's

future-oriented analysis they call for a 'learning' orientation by participants at all levels of social organization, and for world solidarity in the effort, as prerequisite for survival. Paolo Freire's concept of a 'listening dialogue' is also useful.

The 'jury is still out' on the issue of the shape and contents of a new global values system, but from the publications reviewed here I have been impressed with three points:

(1) Any value orientation which purports to acti- vate pro-environmental behaviour must recognize the differences in levels of activation: in the formal institutions of the world order; in the regional insti- tutions of different areas of the end of point; in cross-cutting 'sans frontiers' global organizations; in local institutions and in individuals. These different levels are subject to different constraints, have different resources, and are influenced by different processes.

(2) Any research which aims to contribute to our understanding of pro-environmental behaviour must be multidisciplinary (if not 'non-disciplinary') in character. Monodisciplinary approaches provide useful inputs for the education of professionals, but they r equ i r e to be corrected by complementary perspectives of par tner disciplines in this highly complex natural/psychological/social science field.

(3) Value orientations will form the core of any new global ethic, but unders tanding the role of values in action requires not only the incorporation of a qualified tolerance for cultural diversity but the incorporation of an unders tanding of the rela- tionship between values and interests in social action.

E n v o i

Research and action are both very 'greedy' kinds of activity, and in a time of economic recession there are many problems of establishing priorities both as between the two agenda, and within each. On the action side groups like Greenpeace, Friends of the Earth, the World Wide Fund for Nature, and more recently the Green Cross have been working on urgent environmental issues. The task of longer- te rm programmatic action supported by appropriate research, requires another kind of activity. One must recognize that many politicians and philanthropists tend to seek quick payoffs for their investments in action and/or research. Academics are not immune to this kind of pressure. The challenge for all of us is to make the wisest choices, and this itself may help with task of developing a global ethic.

182 R.N. Rapoport

A c k n o w l e d g e m e n t s

Thanks are due to Nathaniel Lichfield, Elizabeth Sidney and Rhona Rapoport for their comments. ! dedicate this essay to Eric Trist whose passing prior to its publication has made it impossible for this testimony to his wisdom and prescience to be seen by h im- -as was my intention.

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