Intrinsic Branch: Environment

The Environment Branch is special in that its focus isn't specifically on promoting the needs of current Citizens, but instead prioritizes the environment first. This is necessary because the current Citizens may want to use the environment in such a way that eliminates future Citizens' ability to use it. Or some uses may impact people beyond the borders. This doesn't mean that the entire environment must be left pristine, for none to use, but that resource use must be considered with a wide perspective.

The Environment Branch weighs the needs of the current and future Citizens (commercial, recreational, and natural use), wildlife habitats, resource rejuvenation possibilities, non-restorable damage, cross-border contamination, etc. These are complicated, and often conflicting considerations, so this Branch is charged with making the tough choices to protect the environment in such a way as to ensure the environment is available and usable far into the future. Additionally, all uses are weighed against the potentiail long term health consequences of the Citizens.

Using the example of the Neighborhood, consider an apartment building housing many families. Those families will someday move on, so that means that the highest priority is taking care of the building itself, not ensuring that the happiness is maximized of each family currently living in the apartment. When there are other families already living in the unit and future families that will someday move in, the current families will have to make compromises, like not being allowed to knock down a wall to create a bigger living room or setting up a temporary swimming pool indoors that will leak into the units below.