Article ID: CBB001210095

Before and after Silent Spring: From Chemical Pesticides to Biological Control and Integrated Pest Management---Britain, 1945--1980 (2012)

unapi

Gaya, Hannah (Author)


Ambix: Journal of the Society for the History of Alchemy and Chemistry
Volume: 59, no. 2
Issue: 2
Pages: 88-108


Publication Date: 2012
Edition Details: Part of a special issue marking the fiftieth anniversary of the publication of Rachel Carson's Silent Spring
Language: English

The use of chemical pesticides increased considerably after World War II, and ecological damage was noticeable by the late 1940s. This paper outlines some ecological problems experienced during the post-war period in the UK, and in parts of what is now Malaysia. Also discussed is the government's response. Although Rachel Carson's book, Silent Spring (1962), was important in bringing the problems to a wider public, she was not alone in sounding the alarm. Pressure from the public and from British scientists led, among other things, to the founding of the Natural Environment Research Council in 1965. By the 1970s, environmentalism was an important movement, and funding for ecological and environmental research was forthcoming even during the economic recession. Some of the recipients were ecologists working at Imperial College London. Moved by the political climate, and by the evidence of ecological damage, they carried out research on the biological control of insect pests.

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Citation URI
https://data.isiscb.org/isis/citation/CBB001210095/

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Authors & Contributors
Davis, Frederick Rowe
Newman, Richard S.
Steingraber, Sandra
Romero, Adam
Whayne, Jeannie
Varma, Roli
Concepts
Environmental pollution
Environmentalism
Pesticides; insecticides
Chemical pollution
Environmental sciences
Ecology
Time Periods
20th century, late
20th century
19th century
21st century
20th century, early
Places
United States
Great Britain
Love Canal
Arkansas (U.S.)
West Indies
Americas
Institutions
Nuclear Test Ban Treaty; Partial Test Ban Treaty; Limited Test Ban Treaty (1963)
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