Many of society's most pressing problems are no longer just "social."  From the maintenance of genetic diversity to the disposal of radioactive wastes, from toxics in the groundwater below us to global warming of the atmosphere above, the challenges of the 21st century are increasingly coming to involve society's relationships with the environment and technologies upon which we all depend. These interrelationships involve a range of complexities and implications that could not have been imagined in the early days of sociology. They are of sociological interest not just because of their significance to society, but also because of their significance to sociology.

The Section on Environment and Technology was founded to provide a home for sociologists interested in exploring these issues.

• Social and environmental impacts of technological change
  
  
• The role of technology in human life, including consequences of technology for human activities in homes, work places, and other built environments
  
  
• The political economy of resource extraction and waste disposal, at the regional and international levels
  
  
• Social factors contributing to environmental pollution and restoration, including racism and environmental justice
  
  
• Societal implications of natural and technological hazards and disasters
• Dynamics and consequences of community design, planning, and land use
  
  
• The roles of energy and resource use in both community and societal development
  
  
• Public awareness of environmental conditions and problems, and the special features of environmentalism as a social movement, including its interaction with race-, class- and gender-based social movements
  
  
• Social aspects of outdoor recreation activities, and social impacts of recreational projects and problems
  
  
• The forces both leading to high-technology innovation and resulting from it; and -- The social and policy impacts of toxic exposure on human populations and ecosystems.

Return to the main Environment and Technology page.

American Sociological Association Section on Environment and Technology
Web Administrator: Robert Gardner
rgardne@linfield.edu