5.

Dimensions of Environmental
Management
 Topics
• Type of Dimensions
– Economic Dimensions
– Sociocultural Dimensions
– Technological Dimensions
– Ethical and Moral Dimensions
– Political and Legal Dimensions
• Managing Urban Environment
• Managing Local Environment
• Corporate Environment Responsibility
• Concepts of Good environmental management
 Economic Dimensions (ED)
• ED of environmental management looks at the costs and
effects of economic development on the environment. i.e
– How environmental goods and services are priced
– How natural resources can be used to create value
• Economic growth measured:
– GDP, balance of trade, per capita income, HDI, Quality of Life Index
• Tragedy of the commons : The waste and pollutants from
industries flow into common properties (like atmosphere, public
lands, forest, rivers etc) and polluter does not pay for renewal
and regeneration of the degraded environment
• Internal cost - expenses borne by user of resource to gain access to that resource
• External cost – expenses borne by someone other than individual/firm who use resource
• Internalizing the external costs is the concept of bearing all the external costs by those
who reap (draw or harvest) the benefit of common resources
– Indirect cost or external environmental cost are included in the cost of production
• North – South divide
– All G20 countries are North (High GDP, per capital income)
– Developing countries are South
• Economic Globalization and environmental issues
• It has direct impact on six specific global environmental changes:
– Threats to wildlife including spread of alien species
– Loss of biodiversity
– Ecosystem degradation including oceans
– Global warming
– Ozone depletion
– Pollution
 Sociocultural Dimensions
• Common property resources
– Local community has a stake holder
• Managing common property resources or common goods
– accessible and non rivalry are called public goods
– Accessible and rivalry consumption are called common pool resource
– Access can be limited and the consumption is rival are called club goods or toll goods
• People moments and the environment
– Chipko movement :
– Narmada Andholan
• Environmental calamities
– High air pollution level with toxic compounds, Acid rains, Salinization of soil, Global
warming, extreme weather events and so on
• Environmental calamities in many cases are effected by human usage
of natural resources without consideration of ecosystem balances
• Agricultural and meteorological droughts – affecting whole
community
• The impact of environmental calamities classified in to three
categories:
– Direct damage: damage of physical assets, crops, transport
– Indirect damage: could not produced and services
– Secondary effects: GDP,
 Technological Dimensions
• Technology is both
– main cause of environment degradation and
– main solution to environment problem
• Need to use
– appropriate technology
– Different technologies for sustainable development
 Ethical and Moral Dimensions
• Ethics define as “what is right or wrong on a universal basis”
• Moral values are the dominant belief of a particular culture
about what is right or wrong
• View about nature
– Western view – alien and to be conquered
– Eastern view – human being part of nature
– Chines and Indian – nature is mother and goddess
• Religious belief
• Attitudes towards nature
 Political and Legal Dimensions
• International consensus on environment
– Principle of state responsibility
– Good neighborliness principle
– Cooperation of all states
– Citizens have a right to a decent and healthful environment
– Polluter pays principle
– Precautionary principle
– Environmental impact assessment
– NGOs – implementing and monitoring
– Principle of sustainable development
 Managing the Urban Environment
• Urban environment problem
– Air pollution
– Heat island formation due to built-up area, roads, and less tress
– Pavements and roads prevent infiltration, which cause flooding
– Cities are responsible for 75% GHG emissions
– High energy consumption
– Slumps development through illegal occupation of public land
– People live in unsafe location near industries, open drains
– Inadequate water and sanitation facilities
 Managing the Local Environment
• Reversal of top-down to bottom-up learning
• Participatory local appraisal
– Sampling: transect walks, social mapping
– Group dynamics: learning contracts, feedback sessions
– Interviewing: focus group, semi-structured
– Visualization: venn diagrams, matrix scoring
– Planning: mapping and modeling
– Monitoring
 Concepts of Good Environmental Management

• Integration
• Cooperation
• Coordination
• Participation
• Adaptive management
Corporate Environment Responsibility