France, at the end of the 1960s, saw nuclear protest movements emerge because of rising ecological fears.[1]Meanwhile, in 1967, ‘Nature and Youth’ formed in Norway as a radical environmentalist group.[2] Clearly, there existed a European trend of environmental mobilisation in Europe from the 1960s, and, unsurprisingly, the Chernobyl disaster 1986 exacerbated these already strong environmentalist worries.[3] It affected all of Europe and sparked movements in the East and West, making it a core reason for similar movements to develop. Importantly, there occurred trends between Eastern and Western media and governments, as many of them downplayed the effects and levels of radiation fallout. Therefore, this project will argue that media coverage of events; the accessibility of Western media in Eastern countries, such as Poland; and shared mentalities across borders, including parenthood were imperative for causing transnationally similar movements. The event created in both the East and West of Europe a disillusionment with governmental environmental policies, and exacerbated existing worries by certain social groups.
Historiography
Interestingly, there exists a focus on Soviet states in environmentalist literature.[4] Most likely, the unethical environmentalist policies conducted by the USSR fuels this interest. Therefore, this project will use this area as a starting point because of its scholarly significance, and expand Westward. Notably, this will not be a comparative history, but rather an investigation of the durability of the Iron Curtain. It is, on a deeper level, asking how permeable it was to social-political movements.
Methods
Indeed, this essay will use micro-historical and anthropological methods to demonstrate distinct connections between people in different countries. Influenced by anthropologist Harper who, in the 1990s, used individual case studies in Hungary to demonstrate a culture in Hungary after Chernobyl, it will use similar methods, but will widen the geographical scope to almost ignore national boundaries, creating a more broad, transnational picture of environmentalism.[5]Furthermore, Hughes argues that historians evidently need to study environmental history using more global methods, and in a positive reaction to his argument, this project aims to view environmental impacts on a natural, continental scale rather than a man-made nationalistic scale.[6] It could use scientific sources discussing radiation to understand if there is a trend in radiation levels and environmentalist movements, and use newspapers from the period to consider the role of media in this trend. To tackle language barriers, Alexievich’s voices from Chernobyl, translated anthropological sources, and visual sources will play vital roles in this project.
Structure
This paper will have two parts, split by chronology. The first section will consider environmentalism from its start in the 1960s to around 1986. It will investigate the factors that caused environmentalism to grow in multiple countries, and argue for similarity between Eastern and Western European countries. Secondly, and most importantly, it will study environmentalism post-Chernobyl, and use the same points as in the first section to demonstrate that the Chernobyl disaster played on and worsened existing fears. The point of this structure is to highlight the importance of the Chernobyl disaster in unionising environmentalist movements in Europe.
Conclusion
Overall, this project aims to show that environmental movements did transcend national borders. Movements did not depend on an Eastern or Western European identity, but more by personal and shared fears that superseded these borders. It will use the Chernobyl disaster in 1986 to underline that, although movements became more similar by the end of the twentieth century, they bore similarities from the start because of these universal fears.
[1] Sezin Topçu, ‘Confronting Nuclear Risks: Counter-Expertise as Politics within the French Nuclear Energy Debate’, Nature & Culture 3(2) (2008), p.227.
[2] Ørnulf Seippel, ‘From Mobilization to Institutionalization? The case of Norwegian Environmentalism’, Acta Sociologica 44(2) (2001), p.129.
[3] Laurent Coumel and Marc Elie, ‘A Belated and Tragic Ecological Revolution: Nature, Disasters, and Green Activists in the Soviet Union and the Post-Soviet States, 1960s-2010s’, Soviet & Post-Soviet Review 40(2) (2013), p.158.
[4] Anna Barcz, ‘Environmental Cultures in Soviet East Europe: Literature, History and Memory (London 2021).
[5] Krista M. Harper, ‘Chernobyl Stories and Anthropological Shock in Hungary’, Anthropological Quarterly 74(3) (2001), p.115.
[6] J. Donald Hughes, What is Environmental History? (Malden, MA 2016), p.84.
Hi George, this is a fascinating subject and I really like this project proposal. The development of the environmental movement is particularly important, and research into its history will only rise in relevance.
One of the things I think your project can really benefit from is certainty from the outset on the importance of the Pre-Chernobyl and Post-Chernobyl sections. You label the Post history as more important, but does that mean you want to dedicate substantially more of your essay to that side of the topic, or merely have it be a larger share? Having a clear plan of this in the beginning I believe will help make the process of your writing much easier for you.
The other notion that might be advisable is narrowing the scope of your project a bit. While detailing the entire rise of the environmentalist movement across Europe in the Post-War period is admirable, it might be too much to fit in depth in merely a 4000-word project. In this, focusing on solely the West or East, or how interaction between their individual movements influenced each other, may help specify your project in a more manageable direction.
Overall, though, this is a good project idea, and I cannot wait to see how it develops!