Environmental groups had to organize multiple legal challenges, an international lobbying effort and numerous publicity stunts. In the end, though, their campaign to stop Cabo Cortés, a giant tourism development planned for the eastern coast of the Gulf of California, prevailed. President Felipe Calderón this month cancelled government permits for the resort, acknowledging uncertainty over the project’s potential effects on a flourishing marine reserve nearby. Speaking to environmental groups about the decision on June 15, Calderón said: “For its size, it should be absolutely certain to all of us that this won’t generate any irreversible damage, and that absolute certainty simply was not generated.” Opponents of the plans for Cabo Cortés, a 3,800–hectare (9,400-acre) property where the Spanish developer Hansa Urbana had intended... [Log in to read more]