TITLE:
Institutions and Intellectuals That Configure the Concept of the Environment and Development in Latin America and Its Global Impact
AUTHORS:
Fernando Estenssoro, Eduardo Déves
KEYWORDS:
Environment and Development; Environmental Crisis; Latin American Intellectuals; World Politics
JOURNAL NAME:
Journal of Environmental Protection,
Vol.4 No.9,
September
27,
2013
ABSTRACT: This paper is part of a
research into the Latin American thinking on international affairs and a
continuation of a line of work on Latin American contributions to the
environmental discussion installed in the global political agenda in the early
70s. The premise was
that Latin American contributions were initially made by professionals closely
related to ECLAC, UNEP and the Bariloche Foundation. These professionals and
agencies understood how poverty and backwardness were endured by the majority of the
regional and world’s population was one of the main causes of environmental
degradation; consequently, overcoming the environmental crisis meant that
underdevelopment should be eradicated
without delay. This view of the environmental problems was synthesized in the combined concept of “environment and development”, which was also understood in the
region as “eco development”. Finally, the broad phenomenon they wanted to
describe using the terms “environment and development” was summarized in the
concept of sustainable development as
defined in the 1987 World Commission on Environment and Development report “Our
Common Future”.