D6.1 Lessons from Environmental Movements of the past (D16): WP6 – Climate movements, democracy, and change (UNITN)

<p>Over the past two decades, public involvement in environmental and climate-related regulatory decisions has<br>expanded across Europe and beyond. These initiatives have highlighted citizens' rights to information about<br>environmental and health risks while underscoring the democratic imperative of participatory decision-making.<br>Moreover, environmental movements, NGOs, and activists have urged a redefinition of democratic processes.<br>This paper argues that such phenomena emerged as consequences of environmental activism from the 1970s<br>and 1980s. Through analysis of social mobilizations following the Seveso disaster (Italy), the Gorleben nuclear<br>facility controversy (Germany), and the Żarnowiec nuclear plant dispute (Poland), we trace the emergence<br>and evolution of some specific environmental movements, examining their techniques, repertoires, democratic<br>practices, and political demands. Despite their differences, these controversies and the following mobilization<br>introduced environmental concerns into decision-making processes at local, national, and European levels.<br>More significantly, they challenged the structural limitations of governments in managing risk. Confronted with<br>opaque decision-making, technocratic delegation of power, and lack of transparency, environmental<br>movements demanded more participatory governance forms. These movements advocated for including<br>affected communities and citizens in public deliberation, enabling them to raise scientific and moral questions,<br>express autonomous assessments, and help define political priorities.<br>This democratic transformation was largely an unintended consequence of 1970s-1980s environmental<br>mobilization. What began with minimal ambitions – introducing environmental controls and addressing<br>environmental crises – produced results exceeding activists' expectations: renewed political participation,<br>grassroots knowledge production, and alternative participatory democratic models. Nevertheless, these<br>ambitious outcomes were only partially achieved. While national and European institutions received many<br>specific environmental protection and governance requests, citizens' and movements' involvement in decisionmaking<br>processes, along with their proposals for transforming European democracies, remained marginalized.</p>