The Environment and the New Right

The history of environmentalism is like a swinging pendulum, going from an active manipulation of the environment approach to a hands-off one and back again. The New Right took environmental activists as extremists who were taking part in a culture war (123). The Sagebrush Rebellion and Wise Use Movements were actions of opposition to the environmental approaches of the 1960s and 1970s, which focused less on the environment and more on political debates surrounding conservation issues, public lands, and the wilderness (124). The Sagebrush Rebellion saw an increase in conservative political activism in regards to public lands and the environment. Those involved in the Sagebrush Rebellion voiced objection to an expanding government rold in public lands. Instead, they believed the federal government could transfer public land rights to the states, thus, with the states managing the land, priority in management could be given to local interests (132). This Sagebrust Rebellion gave way to a new wave of anti-environmentalism (137). Using political ideas from the Sagebrush rebellion, the Wise Use movement emphasized individual rights to public lands. Centered on the individual, the Wise Use movement sought the right to bear arms and hunt in National Parks and the right to let individuals’ livestock graze on public lands (138).

Battles over public lands in the West helped shape the New Right. The division in environmental politics in America aligned with the divisions happening across politics during the post-war era and the decline of liberalism. Additionally, ideas presented in the Sagebrush and Wise Use movements are ideas reflected in the New Right’s political beliefs. I feel as though the New Right really focuses on individualism and the rights of the individual. Even today, ideas of less federal government, the right to bear arms, and individual freedoms are at the top of Conservatives’ minds in politics. So I think these two movements helped to shape this idea of individual rights. However, I also think these ideas emerging within the New Right could have impacted and helped to shape conservatives’ views on the environment and the role of the federal government in the management of federal lands.  While environmental concerns and opinions of management do not fit neatly within the Democratic or Republican party. The environmental movements of the 80s and 90s leaned towards conservative and helped pave the way for the formation of the New Right.