Is Creation Care a Progressive Political Issue?

Concern for the environment in the United States tends to be identified as a progressive political position, and is often associated with deeply contentious issues like abortion, which most Christians rightly find morally repugnant. However, the identification of creation care as a progressive political issue is due more to unfortunate historical accidents than the nature of the issue itself. Outside of the United States, where political divisions are shaped by different forces, political conservatives are more likely to advocate for environmentalism publicly. Often the debate over environmental policy between political progressives and conservatives in the United States is really a debate over the role of government in pursuing the common good.

Conservation and the National Park Movement

The conservation movement in the United States has its roots in Puritan attitudes toward the common good and the value of creation. Communities in New England were built around land use patterns designed to benefit the community and ensure the productivity of the land for the long term.[1] This attitude spread throughout colonies and was later embodied in the conservation movement.

The first national park was created in 1872 when the Yellowstone Act was passed, declaring that a large tract of land in Wyoming and Montana was “reserved and withdrawn from settlement, occupancy, or sale under the laws of the United States, and dedicated and set apart as a public park or pleasuring-ground for the benefit and enjoyment of the people.”[2] This was a monumental political accomplishment that has politically progressive roots.

The early conservation movement was identified with political progressives––a political movement that was concerned with supporting human ingenuity around the beginning of the twentieth century––especially with the public advocacy of conservationist Gifford Pinchot, a Presbyterian and the head of the Federal Forestry Division. Pinchot’s vision of conservation was largely utilitarian. He wrote, “The first great fact about conservation is that it stands for development. . . . Conservation demands the welfare of this generation first, and afterward the welfare of the generations to follow.”[3]

Pinchot’s democratic, instrumental hope for the conservation movement was directly and publicly opposed to John Muir’s vision for the preservation of lands, untainted by human development. When dealing with the Pinchot’s proposal to construct the Hetch Hetchy dam in Yosemite, Muir wrote, “These temple destroyers, devotees of ravaging commercialism, seem to have perfect contempt for Nature, and, instead of lifting their eyes to the God of the mountains, lift them to the Almighty Dollar.”[4]

The very public debate between Pinchot’s Conservation movement, which was rooted in the progressive politics of his day, and John Muir’s Preservation movement, that opposed the utilitarian understanding of nature, puts the political fault line in a different place that it falls in the early twenty-first century. One danger in assigning labels like “conservative” and “progressive” to historical causes is that issues change, allegiances shift, and ethics that are not grounded explicitly in Scripture tend to morph over time. Muir’s radical conservative attitude toward preservation of nature unspoiled by humans sounds more like a contemporary progressive position, while Pinchot’s perspective tends to align with a more conservative position today. But both positions might be deemed too progressive for some contemporary political conservatives.

Environmentalism and Progressivism in the Late Twentieth Century

The apparent division between pro-environment progressives and conservative opposition to some forms of environmentalism in the United States grew much clearer in the 1970s. In 1968, Paul Ehrlich, a Stanford biologist wrote his famous book The Population Bomb, which argues that the growing population of the earth was overburdening the ecosystem and would result in ultimate destruction of the environment and negative consequences for all of life.[5] Ehrlich explicitly tied hope for Earth’s future to availability of contraception and legalization of abortion.

In 1970, environmentalism was still a bi-partisan concern. The first Earth Day was co-sponsored by Republicans and Democrats. Republican Richard Nixon’s administration, better remembered for the corruption of the Watergate scandal, is considered to be one of the most environmentally positive administrations, marked especially by the formation of the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA).[6]

Because of the broad concern for the environment, Nixon also commissioned the Rockefeller Commission in 1970 to study the relationship between the rising population and American prosperity. The resultant report, Population and the American Future, published in 1972, would help cement environmentalism as a progressive political issue in the minds of many American Christians because it made recommendations including government opposition of “legal, social, and institutional pressures that historically have been mainly pronatalist in character,” and “enabling individuals to avoid unwanted childbearing, thereby enhancing their ability to realize their preferences.”[7] Practical recommendations for implementing the Commission’s lofty sounding recommendations included open advocacy for legalization of abortion, government-funded distribution of contraceptives, and even capping the number of children per family. Understandably many orthodox Christians reacted negatively to these suggestions.

Nearly simultaneously, the culture wars over abortion were ramping up in the United States, with the Supreme Court handing down the contentious Roe v. Wade decision that legalized abortion in all fifty states. The overt connections between support for abortion and advocacy for the environment converted an issue that was largely a prudential argument over how natural resources would be preserved and utilized for the common good into a hotly disputed political weapon that has come to represent a sharp progressive-conservative divide in American politics.

A Two-Party System and Political Division

The relationship between political progressivism and environmentalism is exacerbated in the United States by the established two-party political system. Though there is some variation within each major party, the platforms created by the parties tend to divide along fairly clear lines. Because socially progressive anti-natal policies, such as advocacy for abortion on demand and government mandated access to all forms of contraceptives, have become associated with environmentalism in the United States, right-leaning politicians have tended to oppose many of the pro-environmental proposals Often the basis for rejection of supposedly “common sense” environmental legislation arises because of differences of opinion about the role of the government.

Despite political rhetoric arguing that politicians who oppose particular environmental regulations are advocating for dirty water and an increase in global warming, conservative U.S. Senator Ben Sasse’s statement sums up the basis for opposition: “Everyone wants clean water but the bureaucrats at the EPA were out-of-control, writing new laws to regulate puddles and ditches from Washington. Nobody cares more about land and water than Nebraska's producers but nobody here at home voted for these absurd regulations.”[8] While not free from his own politically-charged language, Sasse notably frames his approval of the repeal of the regulations as disagreement over the nature of governance not the goal of the regulations.

The two-party system in the United States and the radical divergences between the worldviews advocated by both parties helps explain how a fundamentally conservative issue—the proper care and use of the environment––has become the field of unique concern for political progressives.

Global Conservation and Conservativism

Outside of the United States there tends to be a smaller divide between political conservatives and progressives on the issue of the environment. The Tories, more properly known as the Conservative Party in the United Kingdom, have made green politics a vital part of their center-right platform in the twenty-first century, with Prime Minister Theresa May proposing a twenty-five year plan to improve the environment.[9] The need to build coalitions between a plurality of parties to form governments reduces the binary nature of politics, as is found in the United States, opening up opportunities for cooperation despite disagreement in a way that is much more difficult in the US.

Similarly, in Germany the conservative Christian Democratic Union has agreed to work for reducing carbon dioxide emissions and other environmentally concerned policies, based on a need to form a coalition with Social Democrats, another significant political party. This pattern tends to repeat itself across Europe.

These examples raise a question about the nature of conservatism. What someone describes as conservative or what gets branded as conservativism may vary depending on the political issues involved, the sponsorships of the media outlet, and the period in time. Definitions matter as does clear thinking about the issues at stake and the actual goal of environmental policy.

Roger Scruton’s Environmental Conservativism

Sir Roger Scruton offers a particular model of conservative environmental thought. While serving at the American Enterprise Institute, a conservative think-tank, Scruton offered the world a thoroughgoing conservative environmental philosophy in his book, How to Think Seriously About the Planet: The Case for an Environmental Conservativism. According to Scruton,

A conservative environmental policy does not aim at a healthy environment but at other things, which have a healthy environment as their effect. . . . The aim is to establish the conditions under which people manage their own environment in a spirit of stewardship, and in such a way as to facilitate the political actions that may be necessary to accomplish what the “little platoons” cannot embark on.[10]

There is little doubt of Scruton’s politically conservative bona fides. His conservative ideas about aesthetics, politics, and social organization were the cause of political outcry among political progressives when he was named to a voluntary position on a board of a U.K. government housing committee.[11] He advocates for limited government, a free market, and the rule of law, all of which are trademark issues of the traditional conservative movement.

Scruton’s argument is not simply that conservative thought can tolerate environmentalism, but that they are “natural bedfellows.” He writes, “Conservatism and conservation are two aspects of a single long-term policy, which is that of husbanding resources and ensuring their renewal.”[12] This represents the sort of conservativism that directly opposes forms of progressivism that radically revise human institutions and are often instrumental in policies that have long-term negative consequences for human flourishing.

Environment and the Role of Government

In part, political progressives in the United States have tended to latch on to environmental issues because they seem to be solvable with an expanded government. The EPA that Nixon created during his presidency was intended to solve legitimate, widespread concerns like the extreme pollution of rivers, such as the Cuyahoga River fire in 1969. It was one of several rivers to be so extremely polluted by industrial waste, but served as a rallying point for Earth Day in 1970 and for much of the environmental movement in the late-twentieth century.

Political conservatives, while rightly concerned for clean air and water, have observed the expansion of federal bureaucracy into issues of local concerns, as Ben Sasse observes in the quote above. Much of the contemporary rhetoric about potential solutions for climate change from political progressives has involved significant increases in centralized government regulation over individual decisions. According to conservatives, such centralized control over environmental decision often neglects to evaluate the burden of regulations, passes the cost of compliance to those least able to bear them, and fails to account for localized factors that might impact implementation of regulations.

There is clearly more to the discussion of the role of the government than this post includes. However, it is clear from this brief discussion that much of the opposition among political conservatives to environmentalism is due to differing ideals for the implementation of policies that support the common good, rather than a different goal.

Summary

Creation care is not fundamentally a progressive political issue. In fact, it should be a primary concern and more naturally belong within the platform of political conservatives. Instead of seeking common ground and developing a shared vision for the common good, many political conservatives have mistakenly abandoned advocacy for the environment because it has become associated with progressive political causes like the continued legalization of abortion on demand and the growth of a centralized bureaucratic-style government.

[1] Mark Stoll, Inherit the Holy Mountain: Religion and the Rise of American Environmentalism (New York: Oxford University Press, 2015), 54–76.

[2] National Park Service, https://www.nps.gov/parkhistory/online_books/anps/anps_1c.htm, NPS.gov (accessed 12/31/2018).

[3] Gifford Pinchot, The Fight for Conservation (Garden City, NY: Harcourt Brace, 1910), 42.

[4] John Muir, The Yosemite (New York: Century, 1912), 262.

[5] Paul Ehrlich, Population Bomb (New York: Ballantine, 1968).

[6] Byron W. Daynes and Glen Sussman, White House Politics and the Environment (College Station, TX: Texas A&M University Press, 2010), 66–83.

[7] Commission on Population Growth, Population and the American Future (Washington, DC: United States Government Printing Office, 1972), 78.

[8] Senator Ben Sasse, https://www.sasse.senate.gov/public/index.cfm/2017/2/sasse-praises-unwinding-of-waters-of-u-s-rule (accessed 12/31/18).

[9] Her Majesty’s Government, https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/

attachment_data/file/693158/25-year-environment-plan.pdf (accessed 12/31/18).

[10] Roger Scruton, How to Think Seriously About the Planet (New York: Oxford University Press, 2012), 376.

[11] Dan Sabbagh, https://www.theguardian.com/culture/2018/nov/06/sack-roger-scruton-over-soros-comments-demand-labour-mps, Guardian.com (accessed 12/31/18).

[12] Scruton, How to Think Seriously About the Planet, 9.