Environment and Society Questions and Answers

Answer: C

The statement is about sustainable development, which is option C. It holds that economic growth should go ahead only when natural resources are recycled and not exhausted, biodiversity is kept up and the air, water and land are protected.

Economic development, social development and ethno-development are about other dimensions of change and do not carry this environmental condition on growth, so A, B and D are wrong.

The statement matches the standard definition of sustainable development associated with the Brundtland Report.

Answer: B

The key marks both true, but (R) is not the correct explanation of (A).

Ecology movements grow from conflicts over natural resources and the right of people to survive, as in forest and water struggles. It is true that population growth adds pressure on resources, but the movements arise from unequal access and control of resources, not from numbers alone.

Option A would make population growth the cause of the movements, and options C and D deny a true statement.

Answer: C

The item that does not cause global warming is nano-technology.

The greenhouse effect and industrial development, through emissions of carbon dioxide and other gases, are causes. A rise in the earth's temperature is the effect, but it is also listed among the options as part of the warming process.

Nano-technology is not accepted as a cause of warming, which is why the key marks it.

Carbon dioxide from burning fossil fuels, methane from farming and refrigerant gases are the main sources, while nano-technology is a method of working with materials at very small scales and is not a source of heat-trapping gases.

Answer: B

Sustainable development is marked by judicious use of resources, maintenance of ecological balance and keeping soil fertility durable for future generations, which are statements (i), (ii) and (iv). Its core idea is meeting present needs without damaging the ability of future generations to meet theirs. Deforestation, statement (iii), destroys habitats, soil and water regulation, so it is the opposite of sustainable development. Every other option contains (iii), so only option B, (i) (ii) (iv), is correct.

Answer: D

The Women, Environment and Development (WED) perspective makes sustainable development its central aim. It links women's roles in managing natural resources with environmental degradation and development policy, and it grew from eco-feminist thought and movements such as Chipko. Women in Development stresses integrating women into the economy, Women and Development stresses structural inequalities between nations, and Gender and Development stresses unequal gender relations and empowerment. Only WED places sustainable development at its core.

Answer: A

Eco-feminism in India grew out of women's participation in the Chipko Movement, in which village women of the Himalayan region embraced trees to stop commercial felling. The movement made visible the link between women's daily dependence on forests, fuel, fodder and water and the exploitation of nature, which is the basic eco-feminist claim, and Vandana Shiva's writings built on it. The Dandi March, the freedom struggle in general and the Lokpal movement were political movements and did not give rise to an ecological feminism.