The explanation of the environmental crisis and the institutional responses to it were the purpose of Sociology from late

70 s, when appears the new environmental paradigm (NPA), focused, initially, on the study of environmental issues in order to make programmatic progress of the study on interaction between society and environment( Catton and Dunlap, 1978).The celebration of United Nations Conference on the Human Environment which has taken place in Stockholm, as the publication of the Growth Limits report in 1972 started the year environmental policies with a very pessimistic opinion of the degradation environment from the binomial population capacity within the field of environment. The energetic crisis, which started from the 1973 onwards with an embargo of oil production by OPEP, reveals the reality of the environmental crisis and the dependency situation of the society regarding its environment, in this case the oil. The environment degradation was the principal element in the deliberation regarding the growth and its limits (Population Bomb 1968 by Paul R. Ehrlich has played an important role in the ecologic movement for the overpopulation). A few examples of it are in China and India where there are strong and controversial birth control measures existing female sexual discrimination. Moreover, the causes of degradation were analyzed in an article named The Tragedy of Commons, written by the biologist Hardin and published the Science magazine in 1968. Hardin was analyzing the causes of nature degradation through the example of the common lands in the medieval England. The main idea is the individual liberty guided by the logic of maximization of profits causes in the common spaces. Every man wants to increase his earnings and, therefore, increases endlessly the common resources in such a way that obtains profits but not the using cost. Examples of common areas may be oceans, national parks or the same atmosphere, spaces for which there is unlimited free access. The individual logic causes a collective tragedy. Closely related to the idea of the "tragedy of the commons" and together with the social inequality is the idea about the "society of scarcity", the latter focused on the harmful effects of environmental degradation. According Ophulus, ecological scarcity is the result of the existence of limits to growth in the ecosystem. When the planet's carrying capacity is exceeded ecological scarcity ensues, which results in a situation of conflict and oppression. Examples include reducing carbon emissions, promoting energy efficiency or prevent the loss of biodiversity. Testing the diffusion of the concept of sustainable development by the Brundtland Report, this has become a very powerful paradigm in environmental policy but, in turn, has generated a great debate about its definition and implementation. The success of the concept is due basically to harmonized environmental protection with economic welfare, which until then they had been considered difficult to reconcile; to its reformist character, did not advocate radical social changes, and optimistic, pessimism prevailed compared to environmental thinking in the seventies (Jimnez Herrero, 1996). A key element of sustainable development is, as shown in the report, pursuing social justice in the underdeveloped and developed countries and in the international system. The fight against poverty is an essential element of sustainable development, above the physical sustainability. As stated by Langhelle (2000) the fact that was considered a priority the

social justice was not exclusively motivated because they have found a relationship between poverty and environmental degradation, as also highlighted in the report, but because social justice was a central element in itself to sustainable development. The effects of climate change for example, are demonstrable in long droughts in the Sahel that provoke desertification, or the externalities suffered in the Aral Sea by trans vases, fertilizer use and loading arms. Science according to the theory of risk societies by Beck it has become the cause, instrument and source of risk solution to many of them having origins in technological development (Beck, 1998). Chernobyl becomes, here, in the paradigmatic example of the tragedy in the risk society, a kind of shock to humanity which makes changing the perception of technological developments by the population of advanced societies, in this case underestimated. But science is, in turn, a defining of the risks as these are constructed socially and scientifically. And it is, finally, the solution to the problems that it generates. Ecologism suggested a new society, the sustainable society (Dobson, 2000), a less materialistic society, with a profound transformation in its institutions and its spirit. One of the catalysts in this first stage of the environmental movement is the publication of the book The Silent Spring in 1962. Written by Rachel Carson, a zoologist who had worked for the U.S. government, the work, published by deliveries in The New Yorker, warns about the dangers on the environment of the indiscriminate use of pesticides in the U.S. including DDT which was subsequently banned for its carcinogenic effects. The relationship between humanity and the world is challenged by the biocentric ecologism from a position in which nature becomes an intrinsic value and pursues a qualitative change in the relationship between man and nature. The environmental crisis is seen as a broader crisis of Western civilization (McNeil, 2003). Sustainable economic growth is impossible without causing social welfare. Therefore not all the social groups are equally affected neither by environmental problems nor by the solutions to them (Conca and Dabelko, 1998) here enters the paradigm of ecological justice, from this paradigm has been linked to environmental degradation environment with the social justice issues. Under the name of the social justice are included many issues such as environmental racism, ecofeminism, North-South differences (conservation priorities vs.public health), the relationship between militarism and environmental degradation or the question of social justice in the indigenous peoples linked to environmental degradation, such as is the green revolution that dramatically increased agricultural production in underdeveloped countries (Commoner, 1966) with the highest water consumption, energy and land transformation.