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Environmental issues have had been a matter of concern for every nation across the globe. Dealing with such issues had always been challenging for nations together for which government bodies have reacted at national and international levels. But the most convincing and innovative response to environmental problems came in the form of the Environmental Movement. Unlike any government body, Environmental Movements have been considered as the movements of groups that were environmentally conscious to challenge environmental degradation to work at the national, international levels, and local levels (Sastry, 2017). The environmental movement picked up amid the same time as the new social movement when the Vietnam War, the Students movement in Paris, and the Civil Rights Movement were in the full swing. Initially, environmental movements were structured around concerns about hunting and the conservation of wildlife. Later in the 20th century, environmental issues related to sanitation, clean water, clean air, and public health were the focus areas for environmental movements. Extensive support for environmental movements emerged with attention to the story of Love Canal, where children were vulnerable to toxins in the soil below a school on a site that previously was a toxic dump. 1984's Bhopal gas tragedy, the nuclear disaster at Chernobyl (Russia) in 1986, the Alaskan oil spill from Exxon Valdez tanker in 1989, and the Gulf War in the early 1990s were some worldwide discussed tragedies that headed to the ecological crisis at the global level.
Although publication of Rachel Carson's ‘Silent Spring’ in 1962 has been considered as a remarkable step that started the environmental movement in America four major episodes of Stockholm Conference (1972), publication of the report 'Limits to Growth', Brundtland Commission (1987), Earth Summit (`992) played a significant role focusing on the ecological crisis (Salunkhe, 2008). Incidents like the Bhopal gas tragedy in India in 1984, the nuclear disaster at Chernobyl of Russia in 1986, the Alaskan oil spill from the Exxon Valdez tanker in 1989), and the Gulf War of the early 1990s pulled wide attention towards repercussions of environmental degradation. The ecological crisis resulted in the enhancement of consciousness and concern about the environment that further motivated communities, groups, and individuals to begin movements. Several grassroots and big organizations including private citizens, professionals, religious devotees, politicians, scientists, non-profit organizations, and individual advocates contributed to spreading the environmental movement across the world whereas theorists and scholars elaborated the notion of the environmental movement. Various movements have been discussed in history as in the Philippines, a network of groups and associations campaigned against the Western Mining Corporation (WMC), an Australia-based multinational organization. Considerable opposition to the company in its own country, Australia, is based on anti-nuclear sentiments and advocacy for the basic rights of Australian indigenous peoples (Doyle, 2005). Forest movements of the South, in Mexico, Chile, Brazil, Malaysia, Indonesia, Africa, and India have been challenged up with huge pressure.
Dams' construction has also been criticized and opposed during the mid-1980s when the first anti-dam movement was propelled in the North, specifically, the campaign to bail out the Franklin River and its surrounding forests in Australia. A burst of dam-building projects came up in India with Narmada Bachao Andolan. Notably, ‘non-violence' was practiced during anti-dam and other environmental movements of the time. There were cases where people have revoked and adopted non-violent action movements to protect their environment. The non-violent approach was supported by a majority of the groups during environmental movements across the world (Beder, 1991). History talks about voluntary organizations, and many protectors, who were efficaciously concerned about the environment, and their concern reflected by movements where people revoked and adopted non-violent action movements for protecting the environment to emanate environment conservation among the society.