Free Market Environmentalism

Jonathan H. Adler, a professor of law at Case Western University, offers some intriguing thoughts in the Atlantic on the limits of federal environmental protection programs. In his "Is Washington, D.C. Really the Environment's Savior?" he rejects the meme that environmental problems were only getting worse until the federal government intervened, and that all problems warrant a national solution: 

According to the standard fable, post-war environmental conditions got inexorably worse until the nation's environmental consciousness awoke in the 1960s and demanded action. State and local governments were environmental laggards, according to this story, and only the federal government was capable of safeguarding ecological concerns. Events such as the 1969 fire on the Cuyahoga River, memorialized in Time magazine with this picture, are pointed to as support for this traditional account. This fire, which helped spur passage of the 1972 Clean Water Act, is constantly cited as evidence of how bad things were before the federal government got involved. 

Yet the standard fable is just that, a fable - a fictionalized account with some truth, but fiction nonetheless. Let's start with the 1969 fire. There was a fire on the Cuyahoga River in June 1969, Time magazine did run a photo of a fire on the Cuyahoga, and the story of the fire did help spur passage of the CWA. But that's about where the truth ends. The fire was actually a minor event in Cleveland, largely because river fires on the Cuyahoga had once been common, as they had been on industrialized rivers throughout the United States, throughout the late 19th and early 20th centuries. But river fires were costly and posed serious risks to people and property, prompting local governments and private industry to act. The fire was not evidence of how bad things could get, but a reminder of how bad things had been.

Adler is not suggesting that all federal programs are unnecessary or unwise; rather, he is advocating a "free market environmentalism" that emphasizes markets as a solution to environmental problems. His own approach to free market environmentalism is found here. I can't say that I've read it all the way through, but what I've seen is intriguing.

Postscript:  Indur Goklany responds here.