Discuss how 'environmentalism' can be explained with new social movements approach.

Breaking down the question

The command word discuss invites an exploratory, balanced treatment, but the question fixes a specific analytical lens: the new social movements (NSM) approach. The task is to show how the theoretical features of that approach illuminate environmentalism as a movement — and, if done well, to note where the fit is imperfect, especially in the Global South.

Two terms must be handled carefully. Environmentalism is not a single thing: it ranges from Northern middle-class conservation and anti-nuclear campaigns to Southern struggles over forests, water and livelihood. The new social movements approach, associated with Touraine, Melucci, Habermas and Offe, distinguishes post-1960s movements from the older labour movement by their concerns with identity, quality of life and post-material values rather than the redistribution of wealth.

A strong answer therefore does not merely assert that environmentalism is a new social movement; it tests the claim against the defining features of the NSM framework and qualifies it where the Indian and Third World experience diverges.

For related theoretical material on movements, see the note on protest movements and revolution.

How to approach it

Begin by outlining the new social movements approach and its core features: a concern with identity and lifestyle rather than class interest, post-material values, mobilisation through loose networks rather than formal parties, a middle-class social base, and action in civil society rather than the seizure of state power.

Then map environmentalism onto each feature in turn, using concrete illustrations — the anti-nuclear and green-party movements of the West, and Indian struggles such as Chipko and the Narmada Bachao Andolan. This is the analytical core of the answer.

Finally, introduce the qualification that gives the answer depth: the NSM framework was theorised from Western experience, and scholars such as Ramachandra Guha argue that Southern environmentalism is often a livelihood and survival struggle of the poor, blurring the post-material distinction. Conclude with a measured judgement on how far the approach explains environmentalism.

Model answer

The new social movements approach emerged to make sense of the wave of mobilisations that swept Western societies from the 1960s — feminism, peace, civil rights, gay rights and ecology — which the older, class-based theories of the labour movement seemed unable to capture. Theorists such as Alain Touraine, Alberto Melucci, Jürgen Habermas and Claus Offe identified several distinguishing features: these movements pursue identity, autonomy and quality of life rather than economic redistribution; they express post-material values; they draw heavily on the new middle class; they organise through fluid, decentralised networks rather than bureaucratic parties; and they act within civil society, contesting the cultural and symbolic order rather than seizing the state.

Environmentalism fits this template with striking clarity in its Western form. Its central concern is not wages or ownership but the quality of life and the survival of the planet — a classically post-material orientation that presupposes a degree of material security. The anti-nuclear campaigns of the 1970s and 1980s, the rise of green parties, and movements against pollution and for animal rights were led largely by educated, middle-class activists. Their goal was less the capture of power than a transformation of values — a new relationship between society and nature.

The organisational form of environmentalism also matches the NSM description. Rather than a single hierarchical body, environmentalism is a web of loosely coordinated groups, campaigns and non-governmental organisations, held together by shared symbols and moral commitment as much as by formal membership. For Melucci, such movements are best understood as networks that make collective identity itself a stake of the struggle; ecological activism, with its distinctive lifestyle politics of consumption, diet and everyday practice, exemplifies this identity dimension.

Environmentalism further illustrates the NSM emphasis on civil society and self-limiting radicalism. Green movements typically work through public opinion, protest, litigation and lobbying rather than insurrection, seeking to influence the state and the market from without. Touraine's notion of movements as struggles over the direction of historicity — society's capacity to act upon itself — captures the environmental movement's claim to define what kind of future society should choose.

Yet the fit is not seamless, and here lies the answer's critical edge. The NSM framework was theorised from Western affluence, and its post-material premise sits awkwardly with environmentalism in the Global South. Ramachandra Guha and Madhav Gadgil argue that Indian environmentalism is often an environmentalism of the poor — a struggle over forests, water, grazing and fishing grounds on which livelihood directly depends. The Chipko movement of Himalayan villagers and the Narmada Bachao Andolan against large dams were about survival and justice, not post-material self-expression. Here material and identity concerns fuse, and the class base is peasant and tribal rather than urban middle class.

This does not overturn the NSM reading so much as qualify it. Even Southern environmental struggles display network organisation, action in civil society, and a contest over values and development models — features the NSM approach highlights. What they show is that the post-material thesis is culturally specific and that environmentalism is internally plural.

On balance, the new social movements approach explains a great deal about environmentalism: its identity politics, its middle-class leadership in the West, its networked form, and its location in civil society. But it must be applied with care. A complete account recognises that environmentalism spans both the post-material activism of affluent societies and the livelihood struggles of the poor — and that the NSM framework, while illuminating, captures the former more comfortably than the latter.

Examiner's perspective

The examiner is testing whether the candidate can apply a theoretical framework to a concrete phenomenon, not merely describe both in isolation. Weak answers narrate the history of environmental movements and separately define new social movements without ever connecting them. The marks lie in the mapping — showing, feature by feature, how the NSM approach reads environmentalism.

Concrete illustration is decisive. Naming Western instances (anti-nuclear campaigns, green parties) alongside Indian ones (Chipko, Narmada Bachao Andolan) demonstrates range and grounds the theory. Attributing the framework to Touraine, Melucci, Habermas and Offe shows familiarity with the tradition.

The finest scripts also register the limits of the approach. Invoking Guha's environmentalism of the poor to problematise the post-material assumption signals the critical sophistication the twenty-mark format rewards. A confident concluding judgement — that the NSM lens explains much but not all of environmentalism — completes a mature answer.