Geoscience Reference
In-Depth Information
that was not formalised (strictly in policy terms) until the 1987 Brundtland Report
(see section 8.1.6). However, it was the marrying of biological conservation ideas
(and not just broad environmental concerns, as with Stockholm) with development
issues that made the report stand out. This fact, and that it sprang from three major
international bodies, meant that it attracted significant press coverage worldwide. For
example, in the UK The Times ran a major feature on aspects of the strategy each day
of the week of its launch, while the final programme of David Attenborough's Life on
Earth TV series, devoted to the future of wildlife and humans, specifically cited the
Strategy and its conclusions.
There was in 1991 a follow-up to the World Conservation Strategy called Caring
for the Earth: a Strategy for Sustainable Living (IUCN, WWF and UNEP, 1991). Yet
despite a simultaneous launch in several capital cities (the one in the UK had the
Duke of Edinburgh as the lead speaker) it did not capture the attention of the media
as did the original Strategy . The reasons for this are not entirely clear. However,
Caring for the Earth was longer than - and hence lacked the punch of - the Wo r l d
Conservation Strategy . It also lacked a proper summary and key points: these had
focused the reader's attention in the original. This may have been because Caring for
the Earth was subject to extensive consultation and revision but either way it failed
to make anywhere near as big an impact as the World Conservation Strategy .
Yet, while the World Conservation Strategy made the headlines, and even caught
some political attention, it had little immediate effect on the ground, although it did
pave the way for future policy documents. Had the Strategy been properly implemen-
ted then each nation would produce its own national strategy and implement it. A few
countries did develop their own national response on paper but fewer still went on
to implement these. The UK was one such. The Prince of Wales, three governmental
agencies and two non-governmental bodies as well as the WWF launched its national
plan, The Conservation and Development Programme for the UK, in the summer of
1983. Its ten-point action plan was never implemented. Yet the idea that an interna-
tional policy document might spawn national strategies was one that caught on. As
we shall see, more formal international climate and biodiversity policies of the 1990s
(with political leadership from the UN as opposed to being led by non-governmental
organisations), among others, also called for individual national strategies. Here such
strategies, or national action plans, were developed.
8.1.5 TheBrandtReport:CommonCrisisNorth-South(1980)
In the same year as the World Conservation Strategy a report came from a commission
of 18 politicians of international repute (some of them former premiers), led by
West Germany's Willy Brandt. The report (Brandt Commission, 1980) was primarily
concerned with the growing 'Third World' problem (or 'developing nations' as they
are more commonly referred to today). The North and South in the title referred
to the fact that most developed nations were in the north while those developing or
undeveloped were in the south. The report was concerned that the divergence between
the north and south was increasing.
The second report of the Brandt Commission, Common Crisis (1983), pointed
out that the problem of wealth divergence affected both the north and the south and
that both depended on each other. The south depended on the north for financial
 
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