STSC 271 Law, Technology and Environment in 20th C. America
Cross-listed as ENVS 271
Offered:Spring 2008
Quivik MW 2:00-3:30
NEW!
Technology, according to one standard definition, is the means by which humans interact with their environment. Various groups of people value their environment differently, and they use and value different technologies for interacting with their environment. If more than one group occupies the same environmental space, conflict often ensues. Whether through legislation, regulation, or litigation, the law is a principal means of mediating such conflict in modern societies. This course will survey episodes in the history of the United States, especially in the twentieth century, that illustrate technology’s central role in shaping environments, that illustrate groups’ competing visions of what those environments were meant to be, and that illustrate the uses of the law in mediating social conflict concerning technologies and the environment. An important intent of the course will be to lead students to consider various environments along the spectrum of human manipulation, ranging from wilderness to agricultural landscapes and from designed gardens to urban and industrial environments. We will acknowledge physical violence as another method of conflict resolution, but the focus of the course will be on uses of the law by competing groups to mediate environmental conflicts through negotiation of treaties; lobbying legislative bodies to pass laws; influencing regulators to stiffen or weaken regulations; drawing police authorities into the fray; and seeking favorable rulings from the courts.
