The Environmental Movement and the Left: Antagonists or Allies?

This paper examines the potential impact of the Left on the goals, issues, strategies, and constituencies of the contemporary environmental movement, Contrasting the earlier disparagement of the movement by the Left with increased Leftist attraction to the mature movement, it is argued that the Left could contribute a theoretical context for environmental issues and influence segments of the environmental movement through an emphasis on protest strategies and the differential economic impacts of environmental problems.