This Wednesday marks the 50th anniversary of Earth Day, often spoken of as the birth of the green movement and credited with leading to many key environmental protections in the US. The coronavirus pandemic has led the event to , with organisers promising the world鈥檚 biggest online climate conference.
To find out more about Earth Day鈥檚 past, influence and future, 快猫短视频 spoke with Denis Hayes, who coordinated the first one in 1970. 鈥淚 never dreamed I would be here 50 years later, much less Earth Day,鈥� says Hayes, who is 75 now.
People were aware of environmental issues 50 years ago, he says, but they were not a top tier concern and were often siloed, with people who were worried about bird die-offs not aware of inner city pollution from cars, he says.
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鈥淲hat Earth Day did was to pull all of those separate strands together into the fabric of modern environmentalism. After that, all of the different groups worked on one another鈥檚 issues and it became a much stronger, more vibrant, more politically intense movement able to ratchet things up and give them a higher political priority than little niche things,鈥� says Hayes.
The event鈥檚 initial legacy is in little doubt: it played a key role influencing the creation of the US Environmental Protection Agency and environmental legislation such as the Clean Water Act and Endangered Species Act 鈥� laws that were later emulated by other countries.
鈥淔or about five years we were unstoppable,鈥� says Hayes. But it could be argued that in the long term, with climate change accelerating and biodiversity loss unabated, Earth Day has failed in its purpose.
Hayes says while the responsibility does not lie solely with the event, it is true environmental efforts have faltered internationally, with the exception of the Montreal protocol to address the hole in the ozone layer. 鈥淥nce you are dealing with international things, things in the global commons 鈥� the atmosphere, the oceans, migratory species 鈥� then we have been much less successful,鈥� he says.
While Earth Day is a global event, some critics argue that it isn鈥檛 effective in countries where protesting is politically difficult, such as China, which accounts for more than a quarter of global CO2 emissions. Hayes rejects this idea 鈥� for one thing, he notes the US, Europe and Japan are still 鈥渕assive emitters鈥�. Second, he argues such movements can pressure western countries to make green transformations that influence China.
His big hope is that the event this year proves a counterpoint to nationalism around the world. 鈥淚 would love to see coming out of this Earth Day some impetus for Homo sapiens to come together as a species and fly right in the face of this nationalism, and say we鈥檝e got to solve this as a planet.鈥�
We could have been celebrating 鈥楨-Day鈥� instead on Wednesday. Hayes says an advertising executive who advised the team behind the first event in 1970 came up with several names: E-Day, Ecology Day, Green Day, Environment Day and Earth Day. But, he says: 鈥淓arth Day just resonated with everybody.鈥�
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