Environmental Problems, Their Causes, and Sustainability 1

27 andPolitics, Environment,SustainabilityCASE STUDYRescuing a RiverIn the 1960s, Marion Stoddart (Figure 27-1) movedto Groton, Massachusetts, on the Nashua River, thenconsidered one of the nation’s filthiest rivers. Fordecades, industries and towns along the river hadused it as a dump. Dead fish bobbed on its waves, andat times the water was red, green, or blue from pigmentsdischarged by paper mills.Instead of thinking nothing could be done, Stoddartcommitted herself to restoring the Nashua andestablishing public parklands along its banks.She did not start by filing lawsuits or organizingdemonstrations. Instead she created a careful cleanupplan and approached state officials with her ideas.They laughed, but she was not discouraged and beganpracticing the most time-honored skill of politics: oneon-onepersuasion. She identified power brokers inthe riverside communities and began to educate them,win them over, and get them to cooperate in cleaningup the river.She also got the state to ban open dumping inthe river. When federal matching funds promisedfor building a treatment plant failed to materialize,Stoddart gathered 13,000 signatures on a petition sentto President Richard Nixon. The funds arrived in ahurry.Stoddart’s next success was getting a federalgrant to beautify the river. She hired high schooldropouts to clear away mounds of debris. When theriver cleanup was completed, she persuaded communitiesalong the river to create a riverside park andwoodlands along both banks.Now, four decades later, the Nashua is still clean.Several new water treatment plants have been built,and a citizens’ group founded by Stoddart keepswatch on water quality. The river supports manykinds of fish and other wildlife, and its waters areused for canoeing and recreation. The project is testimonyto what a committed individual can do to bringabout change from the bottom up by getting people towork together. For her efforts, the UN EnvironmentProgramme named Stoddart an outstanding worldwideworker for the environment.Politics is the process by whichindividuals and groups try to influenceor control the policies and actionsof governments at local, state,national, and international levels.Politics is concerned with who haspower over the distribution of resourcesand who gets what, when,and how. Many people think of politicsin national terms, but what directlyaffects most people is whathappens in their local community.© Seth ResnickFigure 27-1 Individuals matter: MarionStoddart canoeing on the Nashua River nearGroton, Massachusetts. She spent morethan two decades spearheading successfulefforts to have this river cleaned up.