Dissident from Denmark. - 'The Skeptical Environmentalist: Measuring the Real State of the World' - book review

National Review, April 8, 2002 by Jonathan H. Adler

While environmental progress is indeed the norm today, it is not universal: Positive global trends often mask local or regional regression. Buried in the data is a pattern illustrating the nature of environmental problems-and their resolution: Wealthier societies are healthier societies, and are more willing to devote resources to environmental concerns. But this is only part of the picture. Equivalent wealth increases have not always produced equivalent environmental results. Legal and economic institutions play an essential role in facilitating environmental protection. In his brief discussions of forests and fish, Lomborg hints at the role that property rights play in the stewardship of natural resources, but this awaits a fuller discussion.

The conventional wisdom holds that modern environmental regulation must take most of the credit for positive environmental trends. Yet Lomborg suggests that the role of regulation is overstated. Key turning points in environmental trends often predated federal environmental legislation. In the states, airborne-particulate concentrations peaked in the 1950s, more than a decade before creation of the Environmental Protection Agency. Smoke and sulfur-dioxide levels peaked in London nearly a century ago. Here again, however, Lomborg is reluctant to give the data much interpretation.

Despite these minor flaws, his compilation of environmental data remains invaluable. The Skeptical Environmentalist provides no brief for environmental complacency, but it provides plenty of reasons to feel good about the earth-which is in far better shape than green activists would have us believe. The truth matters: Lomborg's claims are supported by an arsenal of hard data, and are easy to confirm. And that, in the final analysis, is what has his critics so upset.