Approaching the new millenium

Thoughts are put forward in view of the approaching millenium, such things as large numbers of retirees, the phasing out of nuclear energy, the booming of the American economy, and the green movement.

9. Changing People

This chapter delves into the world of radical green discourse, which is a diverse and lively place, home to a wide variety of ideologies, parties, movements, groups, and thinkers that befits imaginative and radical leanings. Those that stress green consciousness believe the way people experience and regard the world in which they live is the key to green change and confronting ecological crisis. This prioritization of consciousness is widespread in the green movement, among deep ecologists, ecological justice and citizenship advocates, bioregionalists, ecofeminists, ecotheologists, and lifestyle greens. Critics stress that consciousness change will not produce the desired results so long as environmentally destructive structures such as states and capitalist markets continue to dominate.

The Green Movement in Iran: Reformist Roots and Objective

The protests that rocked the streets of Tehran and some other major Iranian cities in 2009, gradually coming to be known collectively as the Green Movement, were triggered after the official announcement of that year’s presidential election result. This article will demonstrate how key features of the Green Movement – including the mass participation of youth, women and university students – were rooted in sociopolitical changes that occurred in Iran in the late 1990s and 2000s. The article argues that the Green Movement should be viewed as a reformist movement which sought to implement certain reforms in Iranian society – an agenda also pursued by its leaders – rather than a revolutionary movement seeking to overthrow the Islamic Republic.

ENVIRONMENTAL PROTECTION AND PUBLIC PARTICIPATION IN THE U.S.S.R. DURING THE LATTER 20TH CENTURY

This article considers the evolution of public participation in environmental protection and the “green movement” in the USSR and subsequent legal developments in the later part of 20th century. The article deals with legal history, using the diachronic methods to examine the evolution of public participation in environmental protection under the pressure of the totalitarian regime. The public participation in the USSR is divided into three main historical stages. An overview of the main challenges and achievements of the "green movement” in the USSR during 1950s-1990s is included; as well as causes and consequences of environmental activities in the USSR are highlighted. The three stages of the evolution of public participation in the mid-20th century are as follows: The first stage (up to 1980s) is characterized by the non-politicized activity, usually initiated by students or created by tourist clubs; the second stage (1980s – 1990s) has a special feature that is, liberalization of the political movement; and the third stage (beginning of 1990s) is described by the significant decline of interest in the Nature protection activities, which can be attributed to the unstable political environment at that time.

Iranian Internet Cinema, a Cinema of Embodied Protest : Imperfect, Amateur, Small, Unauthorized, Global

This chapter examines the emergence of what I call ‘internet cinema’ by focusing on Iran in the late 2000s, particularly since the 2009 disputed re-election of Mahmoud Ahmadinejad as president, which unleashed the opposition Green Movement undergirded by this cinema. Iran provides an example of the use of the new internet-driven digital global media in support of democratic ideals that, soon after the Green Movement, rocked many authoritarian regimes of the Middle East and North Africa.