Rather than concluding from this history that, as Allitt put it, “environmental problems, though very real, were manageable,” each side stored up bitterness, like batteries taking on charge. The process that had led, often disagreeably, to successful environmental action in the 1970s brought on political stasis by the 1990s. Environmental issues became ways for politicians to flag their clan identity to supporters—less statements about practical problems with solutions that people could debate than symbols of identity. They signaled membership in a cause: taking back the country, either from
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