Before the environmental movement had gained prominence in this country, one writer began to explore the environment and the human condition as a topic of public policy. From 1963 through 1973 Lynton K. Caldwell was alone among political scientists and policy analysts in writing about the subject in any breadth or depth. His pioneering work led to his role as one of the architects of the National Environmental Policy Act of 1970 and established environmental policy and politics as a field of academic research.

Caldwell's early work is richly relevant to current understanding of environmental policy. This volume brings together the best of his writing from that first decade, making it available for policy debates, theorizing, and reference. This collection is of both historical significance and contemporary relevance and will be invaluable to the many scholars and professionals across various disciplines, fields, and nations who have read and been profoundly influenced by Caldwell's more recent work, including nine widely praised and cited books and dozens of articles.

The fourteen articles and papers in this volume address the definition of environmental policy, analysis of international environmental policy development, and environmental policy as a product of and fundamental challenge to modernity. An original analytical introduction by the volume editors places Caldwell's early work in the context of the research that has followed. Caldwell has written, especially for this book, a new, retrospective chapter, a brief introduction to each article, and an epilogue on the meaning of environmental policy.