Iconic images of Earth from space have inspired a new perspective on sustainability. Pioneers like Rachel Carson and Garrett Hardin raised awareness about environmental degradation. Earthrise and the Blue Marble photographs became symbols of the environmental movement. Reports and concepts like the Brundtland Report, Triple Bottom Line, Biomimicry, and Circular Economy shaped sustainable development. Perspective matters, and we have the power to make positive and responsible choices.

In 1962, Rachel Carson published Silent Spring to bring public attention to the issue of synthetic pesticides and their impacts on humans and the environment, challenging chemical companies with accusations of spreading disinformation, and accusing public officials of unquestioningly accepting the companies’ marketing claims. As the environmental movement began to grow following Carson’s work, attention was drawn to the relationship between economic growth, development, and environmental degradation.

In ‘68, ecologist Garrett Hardin popularized the phrase "The Tragedy of the Commons" with his publication in the journal Science. This describes a situation where a shared-resource  is depleted or spoiled by individual users, acting independently according to their own self-interest.

Often called the most influential photograph ever taken, Earthrise is a photograph taken by astronaut Bill Anders on December 24, 1968, during the Apollo 8 mission. The snapshot gave us a new perspective on our home planet. This image inspired the first Earth Day on April 22,1970.

Earthrise also indirectly inspired the start of the Environmental Protection Agency in 1970 and the passage of other first-of-their-kind environmental laws, including the National Environmental Education Act, the Occupational Safety and Health Act and the Clean Air Act

This photograph, known as the ‘blue marble’ was taken on December 7, 1972. It is one of the few to show an almost fully illuminated Earth as the astronauts had the Sun behind them. The Apollo 17 image was released during a surge in environmental activism during the 1970s, becoming a symbol of the environmental movement, as a depiction of Earth's frailty, vulnerability, and isolation amid the vast expanse of space.

In 1972, the Club of Rome commissioned a group of scientists led by Donella Meadows of MIT to create a system model for the Earth. Their system model looked at the variation over time of our resource extraction, food production and services delivered, industrial outputs, environmental pollution and our global population. Their model suggested that sometime in the coming decades food production, services and industrial output will peak, which will cause the population to peak, before it begins to decline. The modeled historical and current trends suggest an unsustainable future.

The Brundtland Report was published in October 1987 by the UN at the Stockholm Conference. It placed environmental issues firmly on the political agenda; it aimed to discuss society, the environment, and economic development as one single issue, and defined “Sustainable development as development that meets the needs of the present without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own needs.”

In 1994, John Elkington first coined the term the Triple Bottom Line (or TBL) as the sustainable approach to development to counter the traditional single financial or economic bottom line approach of traditional economic development. TBL is the idea that society or people, environment or planet, and profit or economy should be equally balanced and prioritized to achieve sustainable futures.

In 1997, Janine Benyus, author of Biomimicry: Innovation Inspired by Nature, defined her approach as ‘a new discipline that studies nature’s best ideas and then imitates these designs and processes to solve human problems’. 

And finally, in 2010, Dame Ellen Macarthur coined the term “The Circular Economy” as one that aims to redefine growth in a restorative and regenerative way. Ellen Macarthur Foundation's three key principles for the circular economy are eliminating waste and pollution, circulating products and materials (at their highest value), and regenerating nature. It is underpinned by a transition to renewable energy and materials. A circular economy decouples economic activity from the consumption of finite resources. It is a resilient system that is good for business, people and the environment