Economists have long tried to figure out the relationship between economic development and environmental quality. As mentioned here, the link is not clear, but many economists believe (from Wikipedia):
...that many environmental health indicators [for example] water- and air pollution show [an] inverted U-shape: in the beginning of economic development, little weight is given to environmental concerns, raising pollution along with industrialization. After a threshold, when basic physical needs are met, interest in a clean environment rises, reversing the trend. Now society has the funds, as well as willingness to spend to reduce pollution.
This inverted U-shaped relationship is know as the Environmental Kuznets Curve. The quest to document the existence of the Environmental Kuznets curve has frustrated many environmental economists and empirical studies have provided conflicting results at best.
Well, if we can't prove it empirically how about anecdotally? A July 25, Knight-Ridder article found on the environmental news network argues that China has followed this exact path (In China's Dash to Develop, Environment Suffers Severely):
China's environmental woes are so large that they've begun to generate social instability.
Choking on vile air, sickened by toxic water, citizens in some corners of this vast nation are rising up to protest the high environmental cost of China's economic boom.[...]
President Hu Jintao has abandoned a decades-old approach of developing the economy first and worrying about the environment later. He's urged local officials to seek sustainable "green" development. But he's offered no acknowledgment that environmental constraints may hinder his goal of expanding China's economy fourfold by 2020.
Has China reached the threshold and aims to continue developing with improvements in environmental quality, or is China sliding back down the curve?
