The Chicago Region: Nature, Polis, and Ethics
"Farm in the Backyard" by Terry Evans
In conjunction with its other work in Chicago, the Center will co-sponsor, together with various regional partners, a series of civic forums that will focus upon fundamental civic issues and responsibilities that face the Chicago region as it develops into the 21st century.
Chicago is a major Midwestern national and indeed global city, with its own suite of humans and nature issues, as well as problems that it shares with other cities and regions. According to the projections of Metropolis 2020, the Chicago region will grow by one million people by 2020, with a corresponding rise in automobiles. Obvious challenges are being addressed concerning regional transportation, housing, land use, taxation, urban-suburban-rural dynamics, and more.
From a humans and nature perspective, even more fundamental and sobering issues lurk in the background. Will there be enough water to serve this burgeoning human population, along with the region’s flora and fauna? Where will the water come from and at what other regions’ expense? (Lake Michigan and its region’s aquifers are already showing stress.)
How can the larger Midwestern region maintain viable and sustainable agriculture and stem the tide of soil erosion and the use of toxic fertilizers, herbicides, and pesticides? What other land use regimes will be required to protect the region’s ecosystems, flora and fauna, and their evolutionary potential to overcome inevitable environmental stresses? How will (or can) clean air be maintained? What kind of economic activity will allow for a viable future worth living for all the region’s creatures?