3.3.2.5 Ecologism Quiz: AQA Politics, Unit 3

The 20 questions

1. What is the central idea of ecologism?

   • Humans are separate from nature, so environmental limits do not apply to human societies
   • Humans and nature are intrinsically linked, so economic activity must be sustainable
   • Nature exists solely to provide resources for human economic growth, without any limit at all
   • Nature should be managed by the state for the benefit of wealthy landowners and their estates

2. Which distinguishes light greens from dark greens?

   • Light greens are members of the aristocracy, while dark greens are drawn from urban working families
   • Light greens support nuclear power, while dark greens oppose all forms of energy production in every case
   • Light greens seek reform within existing political and economic systems, while dark greens question industrial society itself
   • Light greens reject all reform and call for revolution, while dark greens accept the market economy

3. Which definition of sustainability is most widely used?

   • Maximising economic output in the present, with environmental costs to be paid later by the state
   • Meeting present needs without compromising the ability of future generations to meet theirs
   • Keeping population growth low through compulsory measures imposed by each national government
   • Preserving every natural resource untouched for all future time, with no human use of land at all

4. Which thinker argued that conservation should be a harmony between people and the land?

   • Rachel Carson, who argued that environmental protection must be supported by grassroots campaigns
   • Murray Bookchin, who argued that communities should be decentralised and governed face to face
   • Aldo Leopold
   • E. F. Schumacher, who argued that appropriate technology should empower people at the local level

5. Which thinker's work helped launch the modern environmental movement by highlighting the harm done by chemical pesticides?

   • Aldo Leopold, in A Sand County Almanac (1949), which set out a land ethic of conservation
   • Murray Bookchin, in The Ecology of Freedom (1982), which argued for social ecology and communalism
   • Rachel Carson, in Silent Spring (1962)
   • E. F. Schumacher, in Small Is Beautiful (1973), which argued for appropriate technologies

6. Which thinker advocated appropriate technology and the idea that small is beautiful?

   • E. F. Schumacher
   • Rachel Carson, who argued that chemical pesticides harm wildlife and threaten human health
   • Carolyn Merchant, who argued that historical views of nature shaped ideas about human control
   • Aldo Leopold, who argued that conservation should harmonise human activity with the land

7. Which thinker examined historical changes in how people viewed nature, and linked ecology with participatory democracy?

   • Aldo Leopold, who argued that a land ethic should guide the relationship between people and land
   • E. F. Schumacher, who argued that small-scale technology should empower people in each community
   • Carolyn Merchant
   • Rachel Carson, who argued that chemical pesticides caused harm to wildlife and to human health

8. Which thinker promoted libertarian municipalism and face-to-face assembly democracy?

   • E. F. Schumacher, who argued that sustainable development depends on appropriate small-scale technology
   • Aldo Leopold, who argued that wilderness protection should guide the management of wildlife and land
   • Rachel Carson, who argued that grassroots environmentalism is essential to protecting natural resources
   • Murray Bookchin

9. Bookchin's communalism was based on which principle?

   • Central state planning enforced through a national party that controls every stage of production
   • A monarchy supported by local councils chosen by hereditary families from each region of the nation
   • Decentralised, anti-capitalist communities governed through face-to-face democracy
   • A market economy with minimal regulation and private monopoly in every major industry of the country

10. What did Schumacher argue about technology for developing economies?

    • Technology should be banned in every area of life, since technology always harms the natural world
    • Technology should be reserved for the military, which alone can manage it safely in every nation
    • Technology should be large-scale and imported from wealthy nations without any local adaptation at all, regardless of conditions
    • Technology should be small-scale, appropriate and empowering to people, rather than imposed from outside

11. What is Leopold's 'land ethic'?

    • The idea that humans should treat the land and its living communities as part of a moral community, with respect
    • The idea that land is the sacred property of the monarchy and the church, held in trust for the people
    • The idea that land is a commodity to be sold at market value, with no moral obligation attached to it
    • The idea that land should be owned only by the state and managed for the maximum profit it can yield

12. What was the central claim of Silent Spring (1962)?

    • Chemical pesticides, especially DDT, caused serious harm to wildlife and human health
    • Forests should be cleared to make space for agriculture and urban growth across the whole region
    • Industrial growth was the only route to human prosperity, and it must not be restrained in any way
    • Nuclear weapons have no effect on the environment in any way, so they need no special regulation

13. A community forms a co-operative to repair bicycles and share tools, reducing waste. Which ecologist idea does this reflect?

    • Free-market competition among private manufacturers, each seeking profit for its owners
    • Sustainability and decentralised, community-based action
    • Central planning by the state to maximise output of goods and services across the economy
    • Hereditary authority of local landowners over the community's resources and its productive land

14. A government proposes an airport expansion. How would a light green most likely respond?

    • Support the expansion without conditions, because economic growth always benefits the environment and local communities alike
    • Call for the abolition of all airports and all industry at once, without any transition period
    • Seek to reform the proposal, for example by requiring emissions limits and environmental assessment
    • Demand that the monarchy approve all environmental decisions before any construction can begin

15. An ecologist argues that humans must accept limits to growth because resources are finite. Which concept does this reflect?

    • Free trade without environmental regulation, so that markets set all the limits on resource use
    • Unlimited economic growth through technological progress alone, with no regard to resource limits
    • Compulsory population growth to support tax revenue for the state and its treasury in every decade
    • Sustainability and limits to growth

16. Which is the best evaluation of the relationship between ecologism and the state?

    • Ecologists agree that the state has no role in environmental protection under any political system at all
    • Ecologists agree that the state should be abolished in every case, without exception or transition period
    • Ecologists agree that the state should own all land and resources permanently, without any local role
    • Ecologists differ: light greens work within existing states, while dark greens seek radical decentralisation and economic change

17. Which is the best evaluation of dark green ideas?

    • They are irrelevant, since nature has no value apart from the uses that human beings make of it
    • They raise important questions about growth, but critics argue they may conflict with living standards and technological progress
    • They are fully practical and already adopted by every industrial economy in the world today
    • They are wholly impractical, because ecological concerns have never influenced any policy anywhere in the world at any level

18. Which recent development is central to contemporary ecologism?

    • The revival of coal as the primary source of national power in every industrial economy
    • Climate change and the search for sustainable energy and economic models
    • The abolition of environmental law in most states during the 1990s, as a result of deregulation
    • The removal of all conservation areas to make space for industrial development and new housing

19. How do ecologists typically describe the relationship between humans and nature?

    • Humans should be ruled by a monarch to protect the natural order, which is maintained by royal decree
    • Humans are entirely separate from nature and owe it no moral consideration whatsoever in any case
    • Human nature is fixed by economic class and can never change, whatever the state of the environment
    • Humans are part of nature, so human well-being depends on healthy ecological relationships

20. Which idea does Carolyn Merchant link with ecological concern?

    • Free markets, which allow private owners to decide the use of all land and natural resources
    • Hereditary monarchy, which protects natural resources through royal stewardship in each region
    • Participatory democracy, in which citizens take part directly in decisions about their environment
    • Central planning, which allocates natural resources by ministerial decree from the capital and its regional offices

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