Big-Historical Environmentalism for the 21st Century Priyadarshini Karve https://jbh.journals.villanova.edu/index.php/JBH/article/view/2903
The actions we take and the social-economic-political systems we set up by 2030 will largely cast the die for the future of humanity beyond the 21st century. This situation underlines the importance of seeing the big picture that only Big History can reveal by connecting the dots of events in different spheres of human activity on a planetary scale. Our big-history thinking clearly shows interlinkages between seemingly independent crises that seem to be bombarding us one after the other.
The Earth as a planet will continue to exist and continue to support life in various forms for another about 5–6 billion years, which is estimated to be the life-expectancy of the sun. The environmental crisis that we are worried about is therefore not a crisis for planet Earth but a crisis for our species. The goldilocks conditions that helped humans thrive over the last 2,000 years or so are under threat because of our actions. The ‘ideal’ conditions – from the perspective of an environmentalist – are planetary conditions best suited for humans.
The big-history considerations clearly indicate that to frame environmentalism as a ‘moral duty of humans towards stewardship of nature’ is an extremely arrogant form of human-centric thinking. This thinking often justifies the sacrifice of welfare of a few human communities for the lofty ideal of ‘protecting the planet.’ Ironically, the decision-makers are the drivers of the economy (which is the true cause of the environmental problems). The sacrificed communities are generally the most disenfranchised segments of society such as aboriginal peoples (who played the least role in causing the problems in the first place).
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