ABSTRACT
The philosopher Blaise Pascal pointed out that ``justice without force is powerless.'' Likewise, maternal compassion without paternal strength is powerless. Ecologists know the problem: the politician's tactic to neutralize them is to make sentimental speeches about Mother Nature and to pass generous laws for its protection, but laws with no teeth. No matter how devoted the activists in ecology, how ambitious their mission statements, if the laws for the protection of the environment are not enforced, it remains ``justice without force.'' The mother who begs her husband to stop abusing the children but doesn't back it up with the threat of divorce, the good-hearted school teacher who meditates every day on peace in the world but can't control the class bully, the politician who is devoted to the good cause but has no power in the party ± all are worthless good intentions. Again, Pascal: ``Those who are unable to empower the just, end up justifying the powerful.''
