Stockholm and the Rise of Global Environmental Governance: The Human Environment

This unique history examines global environmental governance through the lens of Stockholm, which has played an outsized role in shaping its development. Fifty years before Greta Thunberg started her School Strike for Climate, Swedish diplomats initiated the seminal 1972 U.N. Conference on the Human Environment that propelled Stockholm to the forefront of international environmental affairs. Stockholm has since become a hub for scientific and political approaches to managing the environmental and climate crisis. Utilizing archival materials and oral histories, Sörlin and Paglia recount how, over seventy years, Stockholm-based actors helped construct the architecture of environmental governance through convening decisive meetings, developing scientific concepts and establishing influential institutions at the intersection of science and politics. Focusing on this specific yet crucial location, the authors provide a broad overview of global events and detailed account of Stockholm’s extraordinary impact. This title is also available as Open Access on Cambridge Core.