Becoming a Leading Player in Protecting the Mountain Environment: The Union Internationale des Associations d’Alpinisme and the Path to the 1982 Kathmandu Declaration

Abstract

In La Moitié de la Gloire, Axel Mayenfisch’s documentary about the 1952 Swiss expedition to Chomolungma (Mount Everest), André Roch recalls how the retreating climbers simply abandoned much of their gear, either leaving it where it was or “throwing it into holes [crevasses].” Roch’s tale was by no means unusual, as mountaineers at that time gave little thought to what became of their waste. By the 1970s, however, climbers were becoming increasingly aware of their impact on the environment. The resulting change of attitude led many mountaineering organizations to take concrete steps to protect the mountains (e.g., cleanup campaigns) and to issue waste management guidelines for trips into the high mountains. The Union internationale des associations d’alpinisme 1982 Kathmandu Declaration—a charter of ten principles for achieving greater harmony with the mountain environment—was an important milestone in this process. Drawing on documents held in the extensive archives of the Union internationale des associations d’alpinisme, the current paper retraces the path that led to the Kathmandu Declaration and the process by which the environment became an important aspect of the aforementioned organization’s work. It also examines the hypothesis that the organization has progressively adopted a conservationist stance toward protecting nature; its aim is to reconcile environmental protection and economic development (especially tourism). The history of the Kathmandu Declaration supports this hypothesis, as it shows how the notion of sustainable development, which emerged in the 1980s, came to dominate conceptions of mountain protection.