Social ecology is the subject of study of social ecology. Prehistory of social ecology

SOCIAL ECOLOGY

1. Subject social ecology and its relationship with other sciences

2. History of social ecology

3. The essence of social and environmental interaction

4. Basic concepts and categories characterizing socio-ecological relationships, interaction

5. Human environment and its properties

1. The subject of social ecology and its relationship with other sciences

Social ecology is a recently emerged scientific discipline, the subject of which is the study of the laws governing the impact of society on the biosphere and those changes in it that affect society as a whole and each person individually. The conceptual content of social ecology is covered by such sections scientific knowledge as human ecology, sociological ecology, global ecology, etc. At the time of its inception, human ecology was focused on identifying biological and social factors of human development, establishing the adaptive capabilities of its existence in conditions of intensive industrial development. Subsequently, the tasks of human ecology expanded to the study of the relationship between man and the environment and even problems of a global scale.

The main content of social ecology is reduced to the need to create a theory of interaction between society and the biosphere, since the processes of this interaction include both the biosphere and society in their mutual influence. Consequently, the laws of this process should be, in a sense, more general than the laws of development of each of the subsystems separately. In social ecology, the main idea is clearly traced, associated with the study of the laws of interaction between society and the biosphere. Therefore, the focus of her attention is the regularities of the impact of society on the biosphere and those changes in it that affect society as a whole and each person individually.

One of the most important tasks of social ecology (and in this respect it approaches sociological ecology - O.N. Yanitskiy) is to study the ability of people to adapt to the ongoing changes in the environment, to identify unacceptable boundaries of changes that have a negative impact on human health. These include the problems of a modern urbanized society: people's attitude to the requirements of the environment and to the environment that is formed by the industry; questions of the restrictions that this environment imposes on relations between people (D. Markovich). The main task of social ecology is to study the mechanisms of human impact on the environment and those transformations in it that are the result of human activity. The problems of social ecology are mainly reduced to three main groups on a planetary scale - a global forecast for population and resources in conditions of intensive industrial development (global ecology) and determination of ways for the further development of civilization; regional scale - study of the state of individual ecosystems at the level of regions and districts (regional ecology); microscale - the study of the main characteristics and parameters of urban living conditions (urban ecology, or sociology of the city).

Social ecology is a new direction of interdisciplinary research, which took shape at the junction of natural (biology, geography, physics, astronomy, chemistry) and humanitarian (sociology, cultural studies, psychology, history) sciences.

The study of such large-scale complex formations required combining the research efforts of representatives of different "special" ecology, which, in turn, would be practically impossible without agreeing on their scientific categorical apparatus, as well as without developing common approaches to organizing the research process itself. Actually, it is precisely this need that ecology owes its appearance as a unified science, integrating in itself particular subject ecologies that developed earlier relatively independently of each other. The result of their reunification was the formation of a "big ecology" (in the words of NF Reimers) or "macroecology" (according to T.A. Akimova and V.V. Haskin), which currently includes the following main sections in its structure:

General ecology;

Bioecology;

Geoecology;

Human ecology (including social ecology);

Applied ecology.

1. History of social ecology

The term "social ecology" owes its appearance to American researchers, representatives of the Chicago School of Social Psychologists -R. Park and E. Burgess, who first used it in his work on the theory of population behavior in an urban environment in 1921. The authors used it as a synonym for the concept of “human ecology”. The concept of "social ecology" was intended to emphasize that in this context we are talking not about a biological, but about a social phenomenon, which, incidentally, also has biological characteristics.

One of the first definitions of social ecology was given in his work in 1927 by R. McKenzill, who characterized it as the science of territorial and temporal relations of people, which are influenced by selective (selective), distributive (distributive) and accommodative (adaptive) forces of the environment. This definition of the subject of social ecology was intended to become the basis for the study of the territorial division of the population within urban agglomerations.

Significant progress in the development of social ecology and the process of its isolation from bioecology took place in the 60s. XX century The 1966 World Congress of Sociologists played a special role in this. The rapid development of social ecology in subsequent years led to the fact that at the next congress of sociologists, held in Varna in 1970, it was decided to create a Research Committee of the World Association of Sociologists on Social Ecology. Thus, as D. Zh. Markovich notes, the existence of social ecology as an independent scientific branch was, in fact, recognized and an impetus was given to its faster development and more precise definition her subject.

During the period under review, the list of tasks that this branch of scientific knowledge, which was gradually gaining independence, was designed to solve, significantly expanded. If at the dawn of the formation of social ecology, the efforts of researchers were mainly reduced to searching in the behavior of a geographically localized human population for analogues of laws and ecological relations characteristic of biological communities, then from the 2nd half of the 60s the range of issues under consideration was supplemented by the problems of determining the place and role of a person in the biosphere, developing ways to determine the optimal conditions for its life and development, harmonizing relationships with other components of the biosphere. The process of its humanitarization that has swept social ecology over the past two decades has led to the fact that, in addition to the above-mentioned tasks, the range of issues developed by it included the problems of identifying general laws of the functioning and development of social systems, studying the influence of natural factors on the processes of socio-economic development and finding ways to control action. these factors.

In our country, by the end of the 70s. conditions have also emerged for the separation of socio-ecological problems into an independent direction of interdisciplinary research. A significant contribution to the development of domestic social ecology was made by E.V. Girusov, A.N. Kochergin, Yu.G. Markov, N.F. Reimers, S.N. Solomina and others.

2. The essence of socio-ecological interaction

When studying the relationship of a person with the environment, two main aspects are distinguished. First, the whole set of influences exerted on a person by the environment and various environmental factors is studied.

In modern anthropoecology and social ecology, environmental factors, to which a person is forced to adapt, are usually denoted by the term "adaptive factors" . These factors are usually classified into three large groups- biotic, abiotic and anthropogenic environmental factors. Biotic factors − these are direct or indirect effects from other organisms that inhabit the human environment (animals, plants, microorganisms). Abiotic factors - factors of inorganic nature (light, temperature, humidity, pressure, physical fields - gravitational, electromagnetic, ionizing and penetrating radiation, etc.). A special group is made up anthropogenic factors generated by the activities of the person himself, the human community (pollution of the atmosphere and hydrosphere, plowing of fields, deforestation, replacement of natural complexes with artificial structures, etc.).

The second aspect of the study of the relationship between man and the environment is the study of the problem of human adaptation to the environment and its changes.

The concept of human adaptation is one of the fundamental concepts of modern social ecology, reflecting the process of human connection with the environment and its changes. Initially appearing within the framework of physiology, the term "adaptation" soon penetrated into other areas of knowledge and began to be used to describe a wide range of phenomena and processes in the natural, technical and humanitarian sciences, initiating the formation of a large group of concepts and terms reflecting various aspects and properties of adaptation processes a person to the conditions of his environment and its result.

The term "human adaptation" is used not only to denote the process of adaptation, but also to comprehend the property acquired by a person as a result of this process, adaptability to the conditions of existence (adaptability ).

However, even under the condition of an unambiguous interpretation of the concept of adaptation, it is felt that it is insufficient to describe the process it denotes. This is reflected in the emergence of such clarifying concepts as "deadaptation" and "readaptation", which characterize the direction of the process (deadaptation is a gradual loss of adaptive properties and, as a consequence, a decrease in fitness; readaptation is a reverse process), and the term "dysadaptation" (disorder of the body's adaptation to changing conditions of existence), reflecting the nature (quality) of this process.

Speaking about the types of adaptation, they distinguish genetic, genotypic, phenotypic, climatic, social, etc. adaptation. implementation and duration of existence. Climate adaptation is the process of human adaptation to climatic conditions Wednesday. Its synonym is the term "acclimatization".

The ways of adaptation of a person (society) to changing conditions of existence are designated in anthropoecological and socio-ecological literature as adaptive strategies . Various representatives of the plant and animal kingdoms (including humans) most often use a passive strategy of adaptation to changes in living conditions. We are talking about the reaction to the effects of adaptive environmental factors, which consists in morphophysiological transformations in the body, aimed at maintaining the constancy of its internal environment.

One of the key differences between humans and other representatives of the animal kingdom is that they use a variety of active adaptive strategies much more often and more successfully. , such, for example, as strategies for avoiding and provoking the action of certain adaptive factors. However, the most developed form of active adaptive strategy is the economic and cultural type of adaptation to the conditions of existence characteristic of people, which is based on the subject-transforming activity carried out by them.

4. Basic concepts and categories that characterizesocio-ecological relationships, interaction

One of the most important challenges facing researchers at the present stage the formation of social ecology, is the development unified approach to an understanding of its subject. Despite the obvious progress achieved in the study of various aspects of the relationship between man, society and nature, as well as a significant number of publications on social and environmental issues that have appeared in the last two to three decades in our country and abroad, on the issue of there are still different opinions about what exactly this branch of scientific knowledge is studying.

According to D. Zh. Markovich, the subject of study of modern social ecology, understood by him as a private sociology, is the specific connections between a person and his environment. Based on this, the main tasks of social ecology can be defined as follows: the study of the influence of the habitat as a combination of natural and social factors on humans, as well as the influence of humans on the environment, perceived as the framework of human life. T.A. Akimov and V.V. Haskin believe that social ecology as a part of human ecology is a complex of scientific branches that study the relationship of social structures (starting with the family and other small social groups), as well as the relationship of a person with the natural and social environment of their habitat. According to E.V. Girusov, social ecology should study, first of all, the laws of society and nature, by which he understands the laws of self-regulation of the biosphere, implemented by man in his life.

Modern science sees in Man, first of all, a biosocial being that has gone through a long path of evolution in its formation and has developed a complex social organization.

Having left the animal kingdom, Man still remains one of its members.

According to the ideas prevailing in science, modern man descended from an ape-like ancestor - Dryopithecus, a representative of the branch of hominids, which separated about 20-25 million years ago from the higher narrow-nosed apes. The reason for the departure of man's ancestors from the general line of evolution, which predetermined an unprecedented leap in improving his physical organization and expanding the possibilities of functioning, was the changes in the conditions of existence that occurred as a result of the development of natural natural processes. The general cold snap, which caused a reduction in the areas of forests - natural ecological niches inhabited by human ancestors, put him in front of the need to adapt to new, extremely unfavorable circumstances of life.

One of the peculiarities of the specific strategy of adaptation of human ancestors to new conditions was that they "staked" mainly on the mechanisms of behavioral rather than morphophysiological adaptation. This made it possible to more flexibly respond to current changes in the external environment and thus more successfully adapt to them. The most important factor that determined the survival and subsequent progressive development of a person was his ability to create viable, extremely functional social communities. Gradually, as a person mastered the skills of creating and using tools, creating a developed material culture, and, most importantly, the development of intelligence, he actually moved from passive adaptation to the conditions of existence to their active and conscious transformation. Thus, the origin and evolution of man not only depended on the evolution of living nature, but also largely predetermined serious environmental changes on Earth.

In accordance with the approach proposed by L. V. Maksimova to the analysis of the essence and content of the basic categories of human ecology, the concept of "man" can be disclosed by drawing up a hierarchical typology of his hypostases, as well as human properties that affect the nature of his relationship with the environment and the consequences for him of this interaction.

The first to draw attention to the multidimensional and hierarchical nature of the concept of “person” in the system “person - environment” were A.D. Lebedev, V.S. Preobrazhensky and E.L. Reich. They identified the differences between the systems of this concept, distinguished by biological (individual, age and gender group, population, constitutional types, races) and socio-economic (personality, family, population group, humanity) characteristics. They also showed that each level of consideration (individual, population, society, etc.) has its own environment and its own ways of adapting to it.

Over time, the concept of the hierarchical structure of the concept of "person" became more complicated. Thus, the matrix model of N.F. Reimers already has 6 ranks of hierarchical organization (species (genetic anatomomorphophysiological basis), ethological-behavioral (psychological), labor, ethnic, social, economic) and more than 40 terms.

The most important characteristics of a person in anthropoecological and socio-ecological studies are his properties, among which L.V. Maksimova highlights the presence of needs and the ability to adapt to the environment and its changes - adaptability. The latter is manifested in the inherent human adaptive abilities and adaptive characteristics. . She owes her education to such human qualities as variability and heredity.

The concept of adaptation mechanisms reflects the idea of ​​how humans and society adapt to changes in the environment.

The most studied at the present stage are the biological mechanisms of adaptation, but, unfortunately, the cultural aspects of adaptation, covering the sphere of spiritual life, everyday life, etc., remain poorly studied until recently.

The concept of the degree of adaptation reflects the measure of a person's adaptability to specific conditions of existence, as well as the presence (absence) of properties acquired by a person as a result of the process of his adaptation to changes in environmental conditions. As indicators of the degree of adaptation of a person to specific conditions of existence, research on human ecology and social ecology uses such characteristics as social and labor potential and health.

The concept of "social and labor potential man ”was proposed by VP Kaznacheev as a kind, expressing the improvement of the quality of the population, an integral indicator of the organization of society. The author himself defined it as “a way of organizing the life of a population, in which the implementation of various natural and social measures to organize the life of populations creates optimal conditions for socially useful social labor activity of individuals and groups of the population. "

The concept of "health" is widely used as another criterion for adaptation in human ecology. Moreover, health, on the one hand, is understood as an integral characteristic of the human body, which in a certain way affects the process and outcome of a person's interaction with the environment, on adaptation to it, and on the other hand, as a person's reaction to the process of his interaction with the environment, as a result of his adaptation to conditions of existence.

3. Human environment and its properties

The concept of "environment" is fundamentally correlative, since it reflects subject-object relations and therefore loses its content without determining which subject it belongs to. The human environment is a complex formation that integrates many different components, which makes it possible to talk about a large number environments, in relation to which "human environment" is a generic concept. The variety, the multiplicity of heterogeneous environments that make up a single human environment, ultimately determine the diversity of its influence on him.

According to D. Zh. Markovich, the concept of "human environment" in its most general form can be defined as a set of natural and artificial conditions in which a person realizes himself as a natural and social being. The human environment consists of two interrelated parts: natural and social (Fig. 1). The natural component of the environment is the aggregate space directly or indirectly accessible to man. This is, first of all, the planet Earth with its diverse shells. The social part of a person's environment is made up of society and social relations, thanks to which a person realizes himself as a social active being.

As elements of the natural environment (in its narrow sense) D.Zh. Markovich examines the atmosphere, hydrosphere, lithosphere, plants, animals and microorganisms.

Plants, animals and microorganisms make up the living natural environment of man.

Rice. 2. Components of the human environment (according to N.F. Reimers)

According to N.F. Each of these environments is closely interconnected with others, and none of them can be replaced by another or be painlessly excluded from common system the human environment.

LV Maksimova, based on an analysis of the vast literature (articles, collections, monographs, special, encyclopedic and explanatory dictionaries), compiled a generalized model of the human environment. A somewhat abbreviated version of it is shown in Fig. 3.

Rice. 3. Components of the human environment (according to L. V. Maksimova)

In the above diagram, such a component as "living environment" deserves special attention. This type of environment, including its varieties (social, domestic, industrial and recreational environments), is now becoming the object of keen interest of many researchers, primarily specialists in the field of anthropoecology and social ecology.

The study of human relations with the environment has led to the emergence of ideas about the properties or states of the environment, expressing the perception of the environment by a person, an assessment of the quality of the environment from the point of view of human needs. Special anthropoecological methods make it possible to determine the degree of conformity of the environment to human needs, to assess its quality and, on this basis, to identify its properties.

Most common property the environment from the point of view of its compliance with human biosocial requirements are the concepts of comfort, i.e. compliance of the environment with these requirements, and discomfort, or non-compliance with them. The extreme expression of discomfort is extreme. The discomfort, or extremeness, of the environment can be closely related to such properties as pathogenicity, pollution, etc.

Questions for discussion and discussion

1. What are the main tasks that social ecology is called upon to solve?
2. What are planetary (global), regional and micro-scale environmental problems?
3. What elements and sections does “big ecology” or “macroecology” include in its structure?
4. Is there a difference between "social ecology" and "human ecology"?
5. Name two main aspects of socio-ecological interaction.
6. The subject of the study of social ecology.
7. List the biological and socio-economic features of the concept of "person" in the system "person - environment".

How do you understand the thesis that "the diversity, the multiplicity of heterogeneous environments that make up a single human environment, ultimately determine the diversity of its influence on him."

Social ecology

Social ecology is one of the oldest sciences. Interest in it was shown by such thinkers as the ancient Greek philosopher, mathematician and astronomer Anaxagoras (500-428 BC), the ancient Greek philosopher and physician Empedocles (487-424 BC), the greatest philosopher and encyclopedist Aristotle (384-322 BC). The main problem that worried them was the problem of the relationship between nature and man.

Also, the ancient Greek historian Herodotus (484-425 BC), the ancient Greek physician Hippocrates (460-377 BC), the famous scientist in the field of geography Eratosthenes (276- 194 BC) and the idealist philosopher Plato (428-348 BC). It is worth noting that the works and reflections of these ancient thinkers formed the basis of the modern understanding of social ecology.

Definition 1

Social ecology is a complex scientific discipline that considers interaction in the society-nature system. In addition, a complex subject of studying social ecology is the relationship of human society with the natural environment.

As a science about the interests of various social groups in the field of environmental management, social ecology is structured into several main types:

• Economic social ecology - explores the relationship between nature and society from the point of view of the economic use of available resources;
• Demographic social ecology - studies various segments of the population and settlements that simultaneously live throughout the globe;
• Futurological social ecology - he focuses on environmental forecasting in the social sphere.

Functions and key tasks of social ecology

As a scientific field, social ecology performs a number of key functions.

First, it is a theoretical function. It aims to develop the most important and relevant conceptual paradigms that explain the development of society in terms of environmental processes and phenomena.

Secondly, the pragmatic function, in which social ecology implements the dissemination of multiple ecological knowledge, as well as information about the ecological situation and the state of society. Within the framework of this function, some concern about the state of the environment is manifested, its main problems are highlighted.

Thirdly, the prognostic function - it means that within the framework of social ecology, both the immediate and distant prospects for the development of society, the ecological sphere are determined, and it also seems possible to control changes in the biological sphere.

Fourth, the function of environmental protection. It involves the study of the influence of environmental factors on the environment and its elements.

Environmental factors can be of several types:

• Abiotic environmental factors - factors related to impacts from inanimate nature;
• Biotic environmental factors - the influence of one species of living organisms on other species. Such influence can be carried out within one species or between several different species;
• Anthropogenic environmental factors - their essence lies in the impact of human economic activity on the environment. Such impacts often lead to negative problems, for example, excessive depletion of natural resources and environmental pollution.

Remark 1

The main task of social ecology is to study the actual and key mechanisms of human impact on the environment. It is also very important to take into account those transformations that act as a result of such an impact and, in general, human activity in the natural environment.

Social ecology and safety issues

The problems of social ecology are quite extensive. Today the problems are reduced to three key groups.

Firstly, these are social problems of ecology on a planetary scale. Their meaning lies in the need for a global forecast in relation to the population, as well as to resources in the context of intensively developing production. Thus, the depletion of natural resources occurs, which calls into question the further development of civilization.

Secondly, the social problems of ecology on a regional scale. They consist in the study of the state of individual parts of the ecosystem at the regional and district levels. The so-called "regional ecology" plays an important role here. Thus, by collecting information about local ecosystems and their state, it is possible to get a general idea of ​​the state of the modern ecological sphere.

Third, the social problems of micro-scale ecology. Here, great importance is attached to the study of the main characteristics and various parameters of the urban conditions of human life. For example, this is the ecology of the city or the sociology of the city. Thus, the state of a person in a rapidly developing city is investigated, and his direct personal impact on this development.

Remark 2

As we can see, the most basic problem lies in the active development of industrial and practical practices in human activities. This led to an increase in his interference with the natural environment, as well as to an increase in his influence on it. This led to the growth of cities, industrial enterprises... But the downside is such consequences in the form of soil pollution, water and air environment... All this directly affects the state of a person, his health. Life expectancy in many countries has also decreased, which is a rather pressing social problem.

Prevention of these problems can be carried out only by prohibiting the build-up of technical power. Or a person needs to give up some activities that are associated with the uncontrolled and destructive use of resources (deforestation, drainage of lakes). Such decisions must be made at the global level, because only joint efforts provide an opportunity to eliminate negative consequences.

Social ecology - a scientific discipline that considers relationships in the "society-nature" system, studying the interaction and interrelationships of human society with the natural environment (Nikolai Reimers).

But such a definition does not reflect the specifics of this science. Social ecology is currently being formed as a private independent science with a specific subject of research, namely:

The composition and characteristics of the interests of social strata and groups that exploit natural resources;

Perception by different social strata and groups of environmental problems and measures to regulate nature management;

Consideration and use in the practice of environmental protection measures of the characteristics and interests of social strata and groups

Thus, social ecology is the science of the interests of social groups in the field of environmental management.

Types of social ecology.

Social ecology is divided into the following types:

Economic

Demographic

Urban

Futurological

Legal

Main tasks and problems

The main task social ecology is the study of the mechanisms of human impact on the environment and those transformations in it that are the result of human activity.

Problems social ecology is mainly reduced to three main groups:

planetary scale - a global forecast for the population and resources in the context of intensive industrial development (global ecology) and determination of ways for the further development of civilization;

regional scale - study of the state of individual ecosystems at the level of regions and districts (regional ecology);

microscale - the study of the main characteristics and parameters of urban living conditions (city ecology or city sociology).

The environment surrounding a person, its specificity and state.

Under the habitat usually understand natural bodies and phenomena with which the organism (organisms) are in direct or indirect relationship. Individual elements of the environment to which organisms react with adaptive reactions (adaptations) are called factors.

Along with the term "habitat", the concepts " ecological environment"," Habitat "," environment "," environment natural environment"," Surrounding nature ", etc. There are no clear differences between these terms, but we should dwell on some of them. In particular, the recently popular term "environment" is understood, as a rule, to be an environment that has been modified in one way or another (in most cases to a large extent) by man. Close to it in terms of the meaning of "man-made environment", "built environment", "industrial environment".

The natural environment, the surrounding nature, is an environment that has not been changed by man or changed to a small extent. The term "habitat" is usually associated with that environment of life of an organism or a species in which the entire cycle of its development is carried out. General Ecology usually refers to the natural environment, the surrounding nature, habitats; in Applied and Social Ecology - about the environment. This term is often considered an unfortunate translation from English environment, since there is no indication of the object that surrounds the environment.

The influence of the environment on organisms is usually assessed through individual factors (lat. Doing, producing). Environmental factors are understood as any element or condition of the environment to which organisms respond with adaptive responses, or adaptations. Beyond the limits of adaptive reactions are the lethal (fatal for organisms) values ​​of the factors.

The specificity of the action of anthropogenic factors on organisms.

Several specific features of the action of anthropogenic factors can be distinguished. The most important of them are as follows:

1) irregularity of action and, therefore, unpredictability for organisms, as well as a high intensity of changes, incommensurate with the adaptive capabilities of organisms;

2) practically unlimited possibilities of action on organisms, up to complete destruction, which is characteristic of natural factors and processes only in rare cases (natural disasters, cataclysms). Human impacts can be both purposeful, such as competing against organisms called pests and weeds, and unintentional fishing, pollution, destruction of habitats, etc .;

3) being the result of the activity of living organisms (humans), anthropogenic factors act not as biotic (regulating), but as specific (modifying). This specificity is manifested either through a change in the natural environment in a direction unfavorable for organisms (temperature, moisture, light, climate, etc.), or through the introduction into the environment of agents alien to organisms, united by the term "xenobiotics";

4) no species commits any actions to the detriment of itself. This feature is inherent only in a person endowed with reason. It is a person who has to fully receive negative results from a polluted and destructible environment. Biological species simultaneously change and condition the environment; a person, as a rule, changes the environment in a direction that is unfavorable for himself and other creatures;

5) the person has created a group of social factors that are the environment for the person himself. The effect of these factors on humans, as a rule, is no less significant than natural ones. An integral manifestation of the action of anthropogenic factors is a specific environment created by the influence of these factors.

Man, and to a large extent other creatures, currently live in an environment that is the result of anthropogenic factors. It differs from the classical environment that was considered in general ecology in the range of action of natural abiotic and biotic factors. Man's noticeable change in the environment began when he moved from gathering to more active activities such as hunting, and then the domestication of animals and the cultivation of plants. Since that time, the principle of "ecological boomerang" began to work: any impact on nature, which the latter could not assimilate, returned to man as a negative factor. Man more and more separated himself from nature and enclosed in a shell of the environment he himself created. Human contact with the natural environment was increasingly diminishing.

1. Subject of study of social ecology.

2. The environment surrounding a person, its specificity and state.

3. The concept of "environmental pollution".

1. Subject of study of social ecology

Social ecology is a scientific discipline that considers relationships in the "society-nature" system, studies the interaction and interrelationships of human society with the natural environment (Nikolai Reimers).

But such a definition does not reflect the specifics of this science. Social ecology is currently being formed as a private independent science with a specific subject of research, namely:

The composition and characteristics of the interests of social strata and groups that exploit natural resources;

Perception by different social strata and groups of environmental problems and measures to regulate nature management;

Consideration and use in the practice of environmental protection measures of the characteristics and interests of social strata and groups

Thus, social ecology is the science of the interests of social groups in the field of environmental management.

Social ecology is divided into the following types:

Economic

Demographic

Urban

Futurological

Legal.

The main task of social ecology is to study the mechanisms of human impact on the environment and those transformations in it that are the result of human activity.

Social ecology problems are mainly reduced to three main groups:

On a planetary scale - a global forecast for the population and resources in the context of intensive industrial development (global ecology) and determination of ways for the further development of civilization;

Regional scale - study of the state of individual ecosystems at the level of regions and districts (regional ecology);

Microscale - the study of the main characteristics and parameters of urban living conditions (city ecology or city sociology).

2. The environment surrounding a person, its specificity and state

In the human environment, four components can be distinguished. Three of them represent the natural environment changed by the influence of anthropogenic factors to varying degrees. The fourth is the social environment inherent only in human society. These components and their constituent elements are as follows:

1. Actually the natural environment ("first nature", according to NF Reimers). This is an environment either slightly changed by man (there is practically no environment on Earth completely unchanged by man, due to at least the fact that the atmosphere has no boundaries), or changed to such an extent that it has not lost the most important property of self-healing and self-regulation. The natural environment itself is close or coincides with that which has recently been called "ecological space". To date, such a space occupies about 1/3 of the land. For individual regions, such spaces are distributed as follows: Antarctica - almost 100%, North America (mainly Canada) - 37.5, CIS countries - 33.6, Australia and Oceania - 27.9, Africa - 27.5, South America - 20.8, Asia - 13.6 and Europe - only 2.8% (Problems of Ecology of Russia, 1993).

In absolute terms, most of these territories fall on The Russian Federation and Canada, where such areas are represented by northern forests, tundra and other poorly developed lands. In Russia and Canada, ecological space accounts for about 60% of the territory. Large areas of ecological space are represented by highly productive tropical forests. But that space is currently shrinking at an unprecedented rate.

2. The natural environment transformed by man. According to NF Reimers, "second nature", or quasi-natural environment (Latin quasi-as if). Such an environment for its existence requires periodic energy expenditures on the part of a person (energy input).

3. Human-created environment, or "third nature", or ar-tepnatural environment (lat. Arte - artificial). These are residential and industrial premises, industrial complexes, built-up parts of cities, etc. Most of the people of an industrial society live in conditions of just such a "third nature."

4. Social environment. This environment is exerting more and more influence on a person. It includes relationships between people, the psychological climate, the level of material security, health care, general cultural values, the degree of confidence in the future, etc. Assuming that in a large city, for example, in Moscow, all unfavorable parameters of the abiotic environment (pollution species), and the social environment will remain the same, then there is no reason to expect a significant decrease in diseases and an increase in life expectancy.

3. The concept of "environmental pollution"

Environmental pollution is understood as any introduction into an ecological system of living or nonliving components that are not characteristic of it, physical or structural changes that interrupt or disrupt the processes of circulation and metabolism, energy flows with a decrease in productivity or destruction of this ecosystem.

Distinguish between natural pollution caused by natural, often catastrophic, causes, such as a volcanic eruption, and anthropogenic, resulting from human activities.

Anthropogenic pollutants are divided into material (dust, gases, ash, slags, etc.) and physical, or energy ( thermal energy, electric and electromagnetic fields, noise, vibration, etc.). Material pollutants are classified as mechanical, chemical and biological. Mechanical pollutants include dust and aerosols of atmospheric air, solid particles in water and soil. Chemical (ingredients) pollutants are various gaseous, liquid and solid chemical compounds and elements that enter the atmosphere, hydrosphere and interact with the environment - acids, alkalis, sulfur dioxide, emulsions and others.

Biological pollutants - all types of organisms that appear with the participation of a person and harm him - fungi, bacteria, blue-green algae, etc.

The consequences of environmental pollution are summarized as follows.

Deterioration of the quality of the environment.

The formation of undesirable losses of matter, energy, labor and funds during the extraction and procurement of raw materials and materials by man, which turn into irrecoverable waste, dispersed in the biosphere.

Irreversible destruction of not only individual ecological systems, but also the biosphere as a whole, including the impact on the global physicochemical parameters of the environment.