ABSTRACT
In recent years, there has been a growing body of literature on environment-related movements in India and elsewhere and the politics of their classification (Basu 1987; Guha 1988). In the Chipko case, for example, there have been arguments over the extent to which 'the' movement (while recognizing that it did not have a unitary organization and ideology) was really part of a tradition of ecologically based peasant movements (Guha 1989) or had deep connections with a 'feminine principle' of nurture (Shiva 1988).
