Complete solutions to all nine exercise questions printed at the end of NCERT Class 12
Political Science, Contemporary World Politics, Chapter 6 Environment and Natural
Resources. The questions are reproduced in the English edition’s own wording, numbering and
lettering, and each answer is written the way it should be written in the exam. The questions the chapter asks in its margins, cartoons and boxes, and its class activity, are answered at the end.
The exercise itself does not differ between the two editions of this chapter: both print
nine questions in the same order, and Question 1 has four options in both, with the same correct
option. The body of the chapter does differ in places, so these answers are written from the
English edition throughout. Three differences worth knowing about, because a Hindi-medium
classmate’s notes will not match yours: the English edition places the world’s first anti-dam
movement in the North, gives no figure at all for Iraq’s oil reserves, and gives
no year for the UN’s definition of indigenous populations.
1 Question 1
Q. Which among the following best explains the reason for growing concerns about the
environment?
a. The developed countries are concerned about protecting nature.
b. Protection of the environment is vital for indigenous people and natural habitats.
c. The environmental degradation caused by human activities has become pervasive and has reached a
dangerous level.
d. None of the above.
Answer: (c) The environmental degradation caused by human activities has become pervasive
and has reached a dangerous level.
Why (c). The chapter opens with a list of exactly this kind of damage, and every item on
it is human-made and worldwide. Cultivable area is barely expanding any more and a substantial
portion of existing agricultural land is losing fertility; grasslands have been overgrazed and
fisheries over-harvested; water bodies have suffered extensive depletion and pollution. According to
the Human Development Report 2016 of the United Nations Development Programme, 663 million people in
developing countries have no access to safe water and 2.4 billion have no access to sanitation,
resulting in the death of more than three million children every year. Natural forests are being cut
down and people displaced, the loss of biodiversity continues, ozone in the stratosphere keeps
declining, and coastal pollution is increasing globally.
Why not the others. Option (a) is too narrow and is not what the chapter says: the
developed countries of the North have their own agenda, ozone depletion and global warming, and the
chapter presents this as one side of a dispute, not as the reason for global concern. Option (b) is
true as far as it goes, and the last section of the chapter is about indigenous people, but it is one
concern inside the larger one and not the explanation for the rise of environmentalism from the 1960s
onwards. Since (c) is correct, (d) cannot be.
2 Question 2
Q. Mark correct or wrong against each of the following statements about the Earth Summit:
a. It was attended by 170 countries, thousands of NGOs and many MNCs.
b. The summit was held under the aegis of the UN.
c. For the first time, global environmental issues were firmly consolidated at the political level.
d. It was a summit meeting.
Answer:
| Statement | Correct or wrong |
|---|---|
| a. It was attended by 170 countries, thousands of NGOs and many MNCs | Correct |
| b. The summit was held under the aegis of the UN | Correct |
| c. For the first time, global environmental issues were firmly consolidated at the political level | Correct |
| d. It was a summit meeting | Correct |
Why each one.
a. Correct. The chapter’s own words: “The summit was attended by 170 states, thousands of
NGOs and many multinational corporations.”
b. Correct. Its formal name is the United Nations Conference on Environment and
Development, held in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, in June 1992. It was therefore held under the aegis of
the United Nations.
c. Correct. The chapter says that the growing focus on environmental issues within the
arena of global politics “was firmly consolidated” at this conference. Environmental concerns have a
long history, and international agencies including UNEP had already been holding conferences, but
Rio is the point at which the environment was fixed on the political agenda of world politics.
d. Correct. A summit is a meeting at the highest level, and the chapter itself calls this
one the Earth Summit and the Rio Summit throughout, so the chapter’s own naming settles it.
3 Question 3
Q. Which among the following are TRUE about the global commons?
a. The Earth’s atmosphere, Antarctica, ocean floor and outer space are considered as part of the
global commons.
b. The global commons are outside sovereign jurisdiction.
c. The question of managing the global commons has reflected the North-South divide.
d. The countries of the North are more concerned about the protection of the global commons than the
countries of the South.
Answer: Statements (a), (b) and (c) are true. Statement (d) is not.
a. True. These are the four the chapter names: “They include the earth’s atmosphere,
Antarctica [see Box], the ocean floor, and outer space.”
b. True. That is the defining feature. These are “areas or regions of the world which are
located outside the sovereign jurisdiction of any one state, and therefore require common governance
by the international community”. Their Latin name, res communis humanitatis, says the same thing.
c. True. The chapter says that “the history of outer space as a global commons shows that
the management of these areas is thoroughly influenced by North-South inequalities”, and that as with
the earth’s atmosphere and the ocean floor, the crucial issue is technology and industrial
development. The same divide appeared at Rio, where the North and the South pursued different
environmental agendas.
d. Not true. The chapter never ranks the two blocs by how much they care. What it says is
that they care about different things: the Northern states were concerned with ozone
depletion and global warming, while the Southern states were anxious to address the relationship
between economic development and environmental management. The South’s position is not indifference;
it is that responsibility should be differentiated, because much of the ecological degradation in
the world is the product of industrial development undertaken by the developed countries.
4 Question 4
Q. What were the outcomes of the Rio Summit?
Answer:
1. What the summit was. The United Nations Conference on Environment and Development,
also called the Earth Summit, was held in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, in June 1992. It was attended by
170 states, thousands of NGOs and many multinational corporations.
2. The three conventions. The Rio Summit produced conventions dealing with climate change,
biodiversity and forestry.
3. Agenda 21. It recommended a list of development practices called ‘Agenda 21’.
4. Sustainable development. There was a consensus on combining economic growth with
ecological responsibility. This approach to development is commonly known as ‘sustainable
development’.
5. Common but differentiated responsibilities. The developing countries’ argument, that
those who caused more degradation must take more responsibility for undoing the damage, was accepted
in the Rio Declaration at the Earth Summit in 1992, and is called the principle of ‘common but
differentiated responsibilities’.
6. What the summit did not settle. It left unresolved considerable differences and
difficulties. The problem was how exactly sustainable development was to be achieved. Some critics
have pointed out that Agenda 21 was biased in favour of economic growth rather than ensuring
ecological conservation. What was obvious at Rio was that the rich and developed countries of the
global North were pursuing a different environmental agenda from the poor and developing countries
of the global South.
5 Question 5
Q. What is meant by the global commons? How are they exploited and polluted?
Answer:
1. Commons first. ‘Commons’ are those resources which are not owned by anyone but rather
shared by a community. This could be a ‘common room’, a ‘community centre’, a park or a river.
2. The global commons. Similarly, there are some areas or regions of the world which are
located outside the sovereign jurisdiction of any one state, and therefore require common governance
by the international community. These are known as res communis humanitatis or global commons. They
include the earth’s atmosphere, Antarctica, the ocean floor, and outer space.
3. The atmosphere. A steady decline in the total amount of ozone in the Earth’s
stratosphere, commonly referred to as the ozone hole, poses a real danger to ecosystems and human
health. The discovery of the ozone hole over the Antarctic in the mid-1980s revealed the opportunity
as well as the dangers inherent in tackling global environmental problems.
4. Antarctica. Since 1959, activities in the area have been limited to scientific research,
fishing and tourism. Even these limited activities have not prevented parts of the region from being
degraded by waste as a result of oil spills. Some countries like the UK, Argentina, Chile, Norway,
France, Australia and New Zealand have also made legal claims to sovereign rights over Antarctic
territory, against the view of most other states that it is not subject to the exclusive jurisdiction
of any state.
5. The ocean floor and the coastal waters. Coastal pollution too is increasing globally.
Although the open sea is relatively clean, the coastal waters are becoming increasingly polluted
largely due to land-based activities. If unchecked, intensive human settlement of coastal zones
across the globe will lead to further deterioration in the quality of the marine environment.
6. Outer space. The history of outer space as a global commons shows that the management
of these areas is thoroughly influenced by North-South inequalities. As with the earth’s atmosphere
and the ocean floor, the crucial issue here is technology and industrial development. This is
important because the benefits of exploitative activities in outer space are far from being equal
either for the present or future generations.
7. Why protecting them is hard. Cooperation over the global commons is not easy. There
have been many path-breaking agreements such as the 1959 Antarctic Treaty, the 1987 Montreal
Protocol, and the 1991 Antarctic Environmental Protocol. But a major problem underlying all
ecological issues relates to the difficulty of achieving consensus on common environmental agendas
on the basis of vague scientific evidence and time frames.
6 Question 6
Q. What is meant by ‘common but differentiated responsibilities’? How could we implement
the idea?
Answer:
1. The dispute behind the principle. The developed countries of the North want to discuss
the environmental issue as it stands now and want everyone to be equally responsible for ecological
conservation. The developing countries of the South feel that much of the ecological degradation in
the world is the product of industrial development undertaken by the developed countries. If they
have caused more degradation, they must also take more responsibility for undoing the damage now.
Moreover, the developing countries are in the process of industrialisation and they must not be
subjected to the same restrictions which apply to the developed countries.
2. What the principle says. The special needs of the developing countries must be taken
into account in the development, application, and interpretation of rules of international
environmental law. This argument was accepted in the Rio Declaration at the Earth Summit in 1992 and
is called the principle of ‘common but differentiated responsibilities’. Responsibility is common,
because the Earth’s ecosystem is one; it is differentiated, because the contributions to its
degradation and the capacities to repair it are not the same.
3. The Rio Declaration’s own words. “States shall cooperate in the spirit of global
partnership to conserve, protect and restore the health and integrity of the Earth’s ecosystem. In
view of the different contributions of global environmental degradation, states have common but
differentiated responsibilities. The developed countries acknowledge the responsibility that they
bear in the international pursuit of sustainable development in view of the pressures their societies
place on the global environment and of the technological and financial resources they command.”
How the idea could be implemented
4. Through the climate convention. The 1992 United Nations Framework Convention on Climate
Change provides that the parties should act to protect the climate system “on the basis of equity and
in accordance with their common but differentiated responsibilities and respective capabilities”. The
parties to the Convention agreed that the largest share of historical and current global emissions of
greenhouse gases has originated in developed countries, and it was also acknowledged that per capita
emissions in developing countries are still relatively low.
5. Through exemptions in binding agreements. China, India, and other developing countries
were, therefore, exempted from the requirements of the Kyoto Protocol, which sets targets for
industrialised countries to cut their greenhouse gas emissions.
6. Through the transfer of money and technology. India finds it necessary that developed
countries take immediate measures to provide developing countries with financial resources and clean
technologies to enable them to meet their existing commitments under UNFCCC. The review of the Earth
Summit agreements undertaken by India in 1997 concluded that there had been no meaningful progress
with respect to transfer of new and additional financial resources and environmentally-sound
technology on concessional terms to developing nations, so this is the part of the idea that is still
waiting to be implemented.
7. Through regional common positions. India is also of the view that the SAARC countries
should adopt a common position on major global environment issues, so that the region’s voice carries
greater weight.
7 Question 7
Q. Why have issues related to global environmental protection become the priority concern
of states since the 1990s?
Answer:
1. The damage had become worldwide and visible. Throughout the world, cultivable area is
barely expanding any more, and a substantial portion of existing agricultural land is losing
fertility. Grasslands have been overgrazed and fisheries over-harvested. Water bodies have suffered
extensive depletion and pollution, severely restricting food production.
2. The human cost had become measurable. According to the Human Development Report 2016 of
the United Nations Development Programme, 663 million people in developing countries have no access
to safe water and 2.4 billion have no access to sanitation, resulting in the death of more than three
million children every year.
3. Forests, species, ozone and the coasts. Natural forests, which help stabilise the
climate, moderate water supplies and harbour a majority of the planet’s biodiversity on land, are
being cut down and people are being displaced. The loss of biodiversity continues due to the
destruction of habitat in areas which are rich in species. A steady decline in the total amount of
ozone in the Earth’s stratosphere, the ozone hole, poses a real danger to ecosystems and human
health. Coastal pollution too is increasing globally.
4. No single government can solve these. If the various governments take steps to check
environmental degradation of this kind, these issues will have political consequences. Most of them
are such that no single government can address them fully. Therefore they have to become part of
‘world politics’.
5. They are political in a deeper sense. Who causes environmental degradation, who pays the
price, who is responsible for taking corrective action, and who gets to use how much of the natural
resources of the Earth. All these raise the issue of who wields how much power, and are therefore
deeply political questions.
6. The build-up before the 1990s. Awareness of the environmental consequences of economic
growth acquired an increasingly political character from the 1960s onwards. The Club of Rome, a
global think tank, published Limits to Growth in 1972. International agencies including the United
Nations Environment Programme began holding international conferences and promoting detailed studies.
The 1987 Brundtland Report, Our Common Future, warned that traditional patterns of economic growth
were not sustainable in the long term, especially in view of the demands of the South for further
industrial development.
7. Rio fixed it on the agenda. The growing focus on environmental issues within the arena
of global politics was firmly consolidated at the Earth Summit of June 1992, which produced the three
conventions, Agenda 21 and the consensus on sustainable development. Everything that followed, from
the UNFCCC of 1992 to the Kyoto Protocol of 1997 and the Paris Climate Agreement, has kept the
environment among the priority concerns of states.
8 Question 8
Q. Compromise and accommodation are the two essential policies required by states to save
planet Earth. Substantiate the statement in the light of the ongoing negotiations between the North
and South on environmental issues.
Answer:
1. Why compromise is needed at all. The two sides begin from genuinely different places.
The Northern states were concerned with ozone depletion and global warming; the Southern states were
anxious to address the relationship between economic development and environmental management. The
developed countries want the environmental issue discussed as it stands now, with everyone equally
responsible; the developing countries hold that much of the ecological degradation is the product of
industrial development undertaken by the developed countries, so those countries must take more
responsibility for undoing the damage.
2. The first compromise: sustainable development. At Rio there was a consensus on
combining economic growth with ecological responsibility. Neither side won outright: the South did
not have to give up development, and the North did not have to give up conservation. That is
accommodation in practice, though the summit left unresolved considerable differences, and the
problem remained how exactly this was to be achieved.
3. The second compromise: common but differentiated responsibilities. The South’s argument
was accepted in the Rio Declaration at the Earth Summit in 1992. The Declaration itself is written in
the language of accommodation: states are to cooperate “in the spirit of global partnership”, and the
developed countries “acknowledge the responsibility that they bear in the international pursuit of
sustainable development in view of the pressures their societies place on the global environment and
of the technological and financial resources they command”.
4. The third compromise: exemptions and equity in the climate treaties. The 1992 UNFCCC
provides that parties should act “on the basis of equity and in accordance with their common but
differentiated responsibilities and respective capabilities”. Since the parties agreed that the
largest share of historical and current emissions has originated in developed countries and that per
capita emissions in developing countries are still relatively low, China, India and other developing
countries were exempted from the requirements of the Kyoto Protocol.
5. What still has to be accommodated. The critics of the Kyoto Protocol point out that
sooner or later both India and China, along with other developing countries, will be among the leading
contributors to greenhouse gas emissions. India, on the other side, is wary of discussions within
UNFCCC about introducing binding commitments on rapidly industrialising countries such as Brazil,
China and India, and feels this contravenes the very spirit of UNFCCC. India also points to its
numbers: its rise in per capita carbon emissions by 2030 is likely to still represent less than half
the world average of 3.8 tonnes in 2000, rising only from 0.9 tonnes per capita in 2000 to 1.6 tonnes
per capita in 2030.
6. Where the accommodation has not yet been delivered. India’s 1997 review of the
implementation of the Earth Summit agreements concluded that there had been no meaningful progress
with respect to transfer of new and additional financial resources and environmentally-sound
technology on concessional terms to developing nations. Until that transfer happens, the developing
countries cannot meet their existing commitments under UNFCCC, which is exactly why compromise on
paper has to be followed by accommodation in practice.
7. The conclusion. No state can protect the Earth’s ecosystem alone, and no state will
accept an agreement that it regards as unjust. Compromise makes an agreement possible, and
accommodation of the special needs of the developing countries makes it workable. That combination is
what produced Rio, the Rio Declaration, UNFCCC and the Kyoto Protocol, and it is what the remaining
negotiations still need.
9 Question 9
Q. The most serious challenge before the states is pursuing economic development without
causing further damage to the global environment. How could we achieve this? Explain with a few
examples.
Answer:
1. The name of the answer. The approach that combines economic growth with ecological
responsibility is commonly known as ‘sustainable development’, and the consensus on it was reached at
the Rio Summit. The 1987 Brundtland Report, Our Common Future, had already warned that traditional
patterns of economic growth were not sustainable in the long term.
2. Cleaner fuel and better technology. India’s National Auto-fuel Policy mandates cleaner
fuels for vehicles. Recent trends in importing natural gas and encouraging the adoption of clean coal
technologies show that India has been making real efforts.
3. Using less energy for the same output. The Energy Conservation Act, passed in 2001,
outlines initiatives to improve energy efficiency.
4. Moving to renewable and alternative energy. The Electricity Act of 2003 encourages the
use of renewable energy. The government is also keen to launch a National Mission on Biodiesel, using
about 11 million hectares of land to produce biodiesel by 2011-2012, and India has one of the largest
renewable energy programmes in the world. India ratified the Paris Climate Agreement on 2 October
2016.
5. Through international agreements that share the burden fairly. The Kyoto Protocol sets
targets for industrialised countries to cut their greenhouse gas emissions, while the principle of
common but differentiated responsibilities keeps the special needs of developing countries in view.
Developed countries need to take immediate measures to provide developing countries with financial
resources and clean technologies, which the 1997 review found had not yet meaningfully happened.
6. Through protection of the global commons. The 1959 Antarctic Treaty, the 1987 Montreal
Protocol and the 1991 Antarctic Environmental Protocol show that shared spaces can be protected by
agreement, and that the Antarctic can be kept to scientific research, fishing and tourism alone.
7. Through community management of resources. Common property regimes work where the
members of a group hold both rights and duties with respect to the nature, levels of use, and the
maintenance of a resource. The sacred groves on state-owned forest land, traditionally managed by
village communities along the forest belt of South India, are the chapter’s own example of a system
that informally forces traditional communities to harvest natural resources in an ecologically
sustained fashion.
8. By listening to the movements and to the people who live in the resource. The
environmental movements are amongst the most vibrant, diverse and powerful social movements across
the globe today, and they raise long-term visions of what we should do and what we should not do.
Anti-dam movements are increasingly pro-river movements for more sustainable and equitable management
of river systems and valleys, and Narmada Bachao Andolan is one of the best known of them in India.
The rights of indigenous peoples matter here for the same reason: they are the single largest group
among the people displaced by various developmental projects since independence, and the loss of land
is the most obvious threat to their survival.
10 In-text Questions (asked within the chapter)
The chapter also asks questions in its margins, under its cartoons and in its boxes, and gives one class activity. They are not in the exercise list, but they test the same ideas, so an answer to each is given here in the order the book prints them.
In-text Q1. Politics in forests, politics in water, politics in atmosphere! What is not political then?
Answer: The margin note makes the chapter’s point. An issue becomes political when it raises questions of power: who causes environmental degradation, who pays the price, who is responsible for taking corrective action, and who gets to use how much of the natural resources of the Earth. Forests, water and the atmosphere all raise these questions, and most such problems are such that no single government can address them fully, so they have to become part of world politics. Anything that involves the distribution of resources, costs and decisions among people or countries can become political; what stays outside politics is only what nobody disputes.
In-text Q2. (Cartoon ‘Global Warming’) Why do you think the fingers are designed like chimneys and the world made into a lighter?
Answer: The cartoon shows a hand whose fingers are built like brick factory chimneys, holding a cigarette lighter printed with the map of the world, with the flame burning on top. The chimneys stand for industry and its emissions of greenhouse gases such as carbon dioxide; the lighter stands for the Earth being set alight, that is, heated up. Together they say that industrial activity is holding the world in its hand and slowly burning it: global warming is the rise in global temperature caused at least partly by these gases, and it may have catastrophic consequences for life on Earth.
In-text Q3. Collect news clippings on reports linking environment and politics in your own locality.
Answer: This is a project. Look for local stories about water shortages or disputes over a river or lake, pollution from a factory, cutting of trees for a road or building project, garbage dumping, or protests by residents. For each clipping, note who caused the problem, who pays the price, and who is expected to act, the three questions the chapter uses to show that environmental issues are political.
In-text Q4. (Cartoon) Are there different perspectives from which the rich and the poor countries agree to protect the Earth?
Answer: Yes. In the cartoon a speaker asks everyone to raise a hand if they want to save the planet; a rich man in a top hat raises his hand with his fingers crossed, while a poorer figure also raises a hand. The rich country agrees in words but does not mean it. The chapter explains the two perspectives: the Northern states were concerned with ozone depletion and global warming and want everyone to be equally responsible, while the Southern states were anxious to address the relationship between economic development and environmental management and argue that those who caused more degradation must take more responsibility. This is why the principle of ‘common but differentiated responsibilities’ was needed.
In-text Q5. Find out more about the Kyoto Protocol. Which major countries did not sign it? And why?
Answer: The chapter defines the Kyoto Protocol as an international agreement, agreed to in 1997 in Kyoto in Japan, setting targets for industrialised countries to cut their greenhouse gas emissions. The best known case is the United States, which signed the protocol but never ratified it, arguing that it would harm the American economy and that it was unfair because developing countries such as China and India were exempted from its requirements. Australia ratified it only in 2007, and Canada later withdrew from it. India signed and ratified it in August 2002.
In-text Q6. That’s a cool principle! A bit like the reservation policy in our country, isn’t it?
Answer: The comparison is apt. Both rest on the idea that treating unequal parties equally is not fair. Reservation gives special provisions to groups that have been historically disadvantaged; the principle of common but differentiated responsibilities says that states have common responsibilities for the Earth’s ecosystem, but the developed countries, which caused most of the historical degradation and command more technological and financial resources, must bear more of the burden, while the special needs of the developing countries are taken into account.
In-text Q7. I heard about some rivers being sold in Latin America. How can common property be sold?
Answer: It can happen when the state takes over or privatises what was earlier managed by a community. The chapter explains that common property rests on the norm that members of the group have both rights and duties over a resource, but that a combination of factors, including privatisation, has caused common property to dwindle in size, quality and availability to the poor. When a government hands the rights to a river’s water to a private company, the community loses its shared control. The chapter’s sacred groves example shows the same problem: trouble arises when legal ownership and operational control are held by different entities.
In-text Q8. I get it! First they destroyed the earth, now it is our turn to do the same! Is that our stand?
Answer: No, that is a caricature of India’s stand. India argues that the major responsibility for curbing emissions rests with the developed countries, which have accumulated emissions over a long period, and that economic and social development are the first priorities of developing countries. But India is not claiming a right to pollute: it has taken its own measures, including the National Auto-fuel Policy, the Energy Conservation Act of 2001, the Electricity Act of 2003, a proposed National Mission on Biodiesel, ratification of the Paris Climate Agreement on 2 October 2016, and one of the largest renewable energy programmes in the world. Its point is fairness in sharing the burden, not freedom to destroy.
In-text Q9. Let’s find out about ‘Chipko Movement’.
Answer: The Chipko Movement began in the early 1970s in the hills of Uttarakhand (then in Uttar Pradesh), when villagers, many of them women, hugged (‘chipko’ means to cling) trees to stop contractors from felling them. It became one of India’s best known environmental movements, demanding that local communities should have control over the forests they depend on. Like the other environmental movements in India that the chapter describes, its most important idea was non-violence.
In-text Q10. (Cartoon in the box ‘Are forests wilderness?’) Do you agree with the efforts made by ecologists? Do you agree with the way ecologists are portrayed here?
Answer: The cartoon shows a group of well-dressed men gathered round an electricity pole, carefully watering the one small sprig growing from it, as though that were saving nature. It mocks a kind of environmentalism that makes a show of small, symbolic efforts while the real destruction continues; the chapter itself notes that forest clearing continues at an alarming rate despite three decades of environmental activism. The portrayal is unfair to many ecologists and movements who do real work, such as the forest, anti-dam and wilderness campaigns the chapter describes, but it is a fair warning against token gestures.
In-text Q11. How are these conflicts (over the Jordan, the Yarmuk and the Euphrates) different from the many water conflicts within our own country?
Answer: The chapter’s examples are between sovereign states: Israel, Syria and Jordan in the 1950s and 1960s over the Jordan and Yarmuk Rivers, and threats between Turkey, Syria and Iraq over dams on the Euphrates. There is no authority above those states, so disputes can turn into the use of force. Water disputes within India, for example between states over sharing a river’s water, take place inside one country, where there is a central government, tribunals and courts to settle them, so they are handled through law and negotiation rather than war, even though they can be bitter.
In-text Q12. (Cartoon of the water bottle) The larger part of the Earth is water than the land and yet the cartoonist decides to show larger image of the land than water. How does the image show the scarcity of water?
Answer: The cartoon draws the world as a bottle of water with the continents printed on it, and only a small amount of water left at the bottom. By showing the land large and the water small, the cartoonist reminds us that although most of the Earth’s surface is water, very little of it is usable freshwater, and that freshwater is running out. This is the chapter’s point about the increasing scarcity of freshwater, which may make disagreements over shared water a leading source of conflict in the 21st century.
In-text Q13. Why don’t we hear much about the indigenous people and their movements? Is the media biased against them?
Answer: The chapter says that issues related to the rights of the indigenous communities have been neglected in domestic and international politics for very long. Indigenous people are often few in number, live in remote areas, and have little economic or political power, so their concerns get less space in a media that follows audiences and advertisers. In India, although the Scheduled Tribes enjoy constitutional protection in political representation, they are the single largest group among the people displaced by development projects, and this is rarely front-page news. Whether or not the media is deliberately biased, the result is that their voices are heard less.
In-text Q14. (Cartoon ‘Spoonful of Ecology’) Do you agree with this perspective where a man from an urban (developed!) area becomes greedy for nature?
Answer: The cartoon shows a man drawn against a city skyline being spoon-fed trees, a rainbow and a butterfly: the urban, developed world consuming nature as if it were food. The perspective has truth in it, because the demand for resources and land from cities and industries is what pushes into forests and indigenous lands, and indigenous people are the single largest group displaced by development projects. But it is not the whole story: city dwellers also support environmental movements, and the chapter shows that responsibility has to be shared, which is the idea of common but differentiated responsibilities.
Class activity (Steps). Each student lists any ten items they consume or use every day (pen, paper, eraser, computer, water and so on) and calculates the amount of natural resources used to make them.
How to do it: This is a calculation exercise, so there is no single answer. For finished products estimate the materials and energy that went into them; for water, estimate the gallons used and the electricity used for purifying and pumping it. Add up the class total, project it to the whole school and then to schools across the country, and compare it with what students in a developed and a developing country might use. The point to draw is the chapter’s own: the consumption of resources, and so the responsibility for their depletion, is unequal.