Viewpoints and Comments ‘Environment’ in Sociological Theory

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261 

feminism in recent times (Shiva 1988; Agarwal 1991, 1997; 

Venkateswaran 1995).

 

Discussion among the activists and the social scientists have also 

centred around the environmental and social costs of development 

planning in India, the latter invariably being borne by the poor. Several 

studies, including those of Rao (1995) and Sharma  (1996) have 

underlined it. Although it is recognised that environmental degradation 

threatens all, irrespective of people's wealth, privilege, status or class, 

the fact nonetheless remains, especially in the developing countries like 

India, that the weak,  the poor and the underprivileged are the worst 

victims of it. Displacement, marginalisation and deterioration of the 

quality of life of large sections of the population, the tribals, nomadic 

communities, craftsmen, the urban and the rural poor and women, as a 

result of the economic policies of the government have concerned both 

social scientists and activists alike. The aim is to work out an alternative 

framework of development which would combine sustainability with 

equity and social justice. It can hardly be overstated that everywhere in 

the developing countries, as in India, protests and struggles by rural and 

urban communities for control, access and management of natural 

resources upon which their lives and livelihood depend, are taking place 

and gaining worldwide recognition. Friedman and Rangan call it 

'environmental action' (1993:4).

 

Contemporary ecological movements, especially the Chipko 

movement and the Narmada Bachao Andolan, as well as conflicts over 

natural resources like water, forest and fisheries have recently found a 

place in social science research in India (Shiva 1991; Gadgil and Guha 

1996; Baviskar 1995; Kurien 1993; Berreman 1989; Jain 1984; Omvedt 

1987). Conflicts/struggles over forest, water, fish, land, pasture and 

village commons being widespread all over the country, many studies on 

these aspects are needed; it is also a fact that there is a tradition of study 

of social movements in sociology.

 

Each of these areas needs to be further explored and researched 

before a comprehensive understanding of a situation as complex and 

varied as ours can emerge. Social scientists must turn their attention to 

these issues which have so far been regarded as outside the purview of 

serious social science research, and left to environmentalists, journalists 

and activists.

 

The somewhat non-systematic and fragmentary character of the 

existing literature/discussion on issues concerning environment and 

society is reflected in the present article. A sociological/social science 

perspective in the analysis of environmental issues is still emerging. 

While a very broad area of study has opened up in the last two decades

 

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Sociological Bulletin 

or so, it still remains ton the margins of the disciplines unabsorbed and 

therefore not properly integrated. Responding to the demands of social 

reality, sociologists are just beginning to explore the many dimensions of 

the environmental problems of our times. But the infinite possibilities for 

research and reflection exist amidst a relative poverty of theoretical and 

conceptual clarity.

 

The task is rendered difficult, to my mind, by the fact that analysis of 

environmental issues and problems must necessarily incorporate the 

historical and the global context just as it must be truly interdisciplinary 

for an insightful understanding to emerge. One can only hope that 

sociologists in India will pay serious attention to issues related to 

environment and society  not because they are currently in vogue, but 

because they represent a major challenge of our times.

 

Conclusion

 

On a more general level, it is amply clear that the most crucial 

contradiction of our times is the one between industrial/capitalist mode 

of production and consumption on the one hand, and ecology on the 

other. There are external constraints to growth which are rapidly being 

violated, causing loss of physical and mental well-being. Not just one 

class but all sections of society suffer or may suffer from the ecological 

and socio-ecological consequences of this mode. An awareness of the 

threat to survival has given rise to a new kind of politics and political 

action which questions and challenges the agenda of development, and 

puts forward ideas of alternative development, life style, values, in other 

words, a more 'sustainable human development'

3

. Given the fundamental 

nature of these issues, it is only right that they should form the basis for 

sociological enquiry.

 

The ecological/environmental perspective opens up the hitherto 

unexplored dimensions of some of the important areas of sociological 

concern.

 

As a powerful critique of the modernisation/development 

agenda, this perspective brings out the unsustainability of the 

project. The industrial capitalist mode of production and 

consumption destroys the very resource base necessary for its 

existence, but even more, threatens human life itself.  With the 

growth of ecological politics and movements, a new  area of 

sociological enquiry has opened up which transcends the 

conventional dichotomy of the right and left politics, cuts across

 

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263 

class divisions and even national boundaries and creates spaces 

for activism within the civil society using the popular initiative. 

In a fundamental sense, it calls for a redefinition of the relation 

between human beings and their natural environment, and a 

reconsideration of the effect of human action upon nature. More 

than ever before, the view that nature must be mastered, 

controlled and used for the satisfaction of ever-increasing human 

needs, that is, the ideology of the industrial mode, is being 

seriously challenged.

 

More recently, a course on environment and society should form a