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Global Environmental Management

Global Environmental Management. Effective Management Requires:. Understanding Change Understanding the Range of Options Selecting Desirable Futures among the Options Managing Change to Achieve a Desirable Future. Understanding Change In the Global Environment.

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Global Environmental Management

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  1. Global Environmental Management

  2. Effective Management Requires: • Understanding Change • Understanding the Range of Options • Selecting Desirable Futures among the Options • Managing Change to Achieve a Desirable Future

  3. Understanding ChangeIn the Global Environment • Environmental change is natural, normal • Some change is predictable to an incredible degree • Daylight, phases of the moon, tides • Other change is cyclical but less predictable • Severity of the seasons, periods and strengths of El Ninos, periods of glaciation

  4. Coping with Episodic Change • Episodic Change is Harder to Predict, at Least Very Far in Advance • Earthquakes, tsunamis, volcanic eruptions, hurricanes, tornadoes, hail, floods, blizzards • Amelioration • Understanding the physical processes • Taking into account the risks • Making individual and group decisions

  5. Differentiating NaturalAnd Human-Induced Changed • Issue when change occurs: is the change part of natural fluctuations or even a new natural trend, or is it because of what people have done to the global circulation system? • How do you know what you know? Global warming has now been studied scientifically for a couple of decades

  6. Weight of Scientific Evidence • Human activity is warming the atmosphere • Industrial and internal combustion engine pollution have changed the content of the atmosphere, impacting solar radiation, & plant function • Human activity is dissipating the ozone layer • Covering surfaces impedes the penetration of water into soil and the water table

  7. Environmental Dilemma • Which is worse? • Ignoring a problem we should address? • Acting when no action is necessary?

  8. Agreeing on Desirable Futures • Achieving a desirable future requires agreeing on what the future should be as well as agreeing on what processes and policies are desirable in and of themselves • What do we see as an appropriate way for us to live? • What kind of world do we want to leave for our descendents?

  9. Scale & Environmental Policy • Eleanor Ostrom: • Environmental issues should be addressed by institutions encompassing sufficiently extensive territories to internalize externalities or eliminate spillovers • Environmental issues should be addressed by the most local institution that can deal with the problem

  10. Jurisdictional Assignments • We need to have government large enough to address the issue but near enough to be responsive to those really involved • So, what issues should be addressed by municipalities, counties, states and federal governments? Regional institutions? The whole world?

  11. Addressing Global Warming • What is it? • Why is it happening? • What difference does it make? • What should be done about it? • How should it be addressed?

  12. External View • US is the rich kid who owns the ball and therefore wants to make all the rules • Problem: The ball is planet Earth, and it belongs to everyone. In addition, a solution will require global cooperation • What is the cost of being wrong?

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