This book, built from archival documents and exclusive interviews with leading figures in the development of political and social ecology, relates how environmental concerns have progressed and spread. It recalls a few battles - and also a few wanderings - of a movement that ultimately knew how to crystallize, with uncommon passion and conviction, an awareness and values ​​that are essential today for the future of the world.

Minister Marcel Léger was not mistaken when he invited, 40 years ago, the new generation of the time to take up the ecological challenge. The young people of yesterday whom he was addressing are now approaching retirement age. The environmental movement that “thinks globally and acts locally” is defined today according to multiple causes. What made all its strength. At the same time, Greta Tunberg's generation of eco-anxiety and social media reminds us that there are battles to be fought. To participate, each in their own way, is a civic duty.

This essay therefore traces the evolution of the ecological movement and the permanence of its issues. The book is divided into three parts, recounting the various moments of this ongoing battle.

First part. In the 1960s, scientists expressed doubts about the benefits of headlong progress. Concerns about pollution arise. Is industrialization, insidiously, poisoning us? Are we abusing the planet's resources? The first citizen groups are forming and taking up the cause of the planet. They will be sentinels but also whistleblowers.

Second part. The crusade for ecology takes a completely different path when environmental issues clearly become economic issues. Especially when it is shown that the use of fossil fuels causes a planetary climatic imbalance. Diplomats get involved, travel a lot – Stockholm, Nairobi, Toronto, Geneva, Rio de Janeiro, Kyoto, Montreal, Johannesburg, Copenhagen – and write many international agreements so that the planet can change course. Will the game be played above environmental groups?

Third part. Too few shares? Too much procrastination? Environmentalists are getting impatient with policymakers who seem to want to spare the goat and the cabbage. Maintaining economic growth and countering waste and environmental damage by opting for sustainable development is not enough. And the number of battles being played out at all levels is increasing: protest against the installation of a pipeline, against logging, for the protection of batrachians or forest-dwelling caribou, to improve public transport, etc. Never has the slogan “think globally, act locally” been so obvious. But the green mobilization follows a planetary cause - that of the climate - involving a new generation, anxious about the future, which is rising to the front.

Raymond Lemieux is a journalist. He has covered scientific and environmental news for many years for many media. He was editor-in-chief of the magazine Québec Science for more than 20 years. A graduate in communications from the University of Quebec in Montreal, he is the recipient of the 2019 Thérèse-Patry Prize for his exceptional contribution to scientific culture. He is the author of the biography of microbiologist Félix d'Hérelle (Éditions MultiMondes, 2019).