Environmental Justice

Abstract

The article reviews two decades of scholars' claims that exposures to pollution and other environmental risks are unequally distributed by race and class, examines case studies of environmental justice social movements and the history and politics of environmental justice policy making in the United States, and describes the emerging issue of global climate justice. The authors engage the contentious literature on how to quantitatively measure and document environmental injustice, especially the complex problems of having data of very different types and areas (such as zip codes, census tracts, or concentric circles) around polluting facilities or exposed populations. Also considered is the value of perspectives from critical race theory and ethnic studies for making sense of these social phenomena. The article concludes with a discussion of the globalization of the environmental justice movement, discourse, and issues, as well as with some policy implications of finding and understanding environmental justice. One unique feature of this review is its breadth and diversity, given the different approaches taken by the three coauthors.

Does living by the coast improve health and wellbeing?

“…The well-established and important literature on environmental justice has primarily focused on the negative aspects and consequences of unequal/inequitable exposures to environmental hazards by race, socioeconomic status and so on (Kjellstrom et al, 2007;Mohai et al, 2009). However, our study and others (de Vries et al, 2003;Maas et al, 2006;Mitchell and Popham, 2008) indicate that access to 'good' environments may play a part in reducing health inequalities.…”

A Bridge to Challenging Environmental Inequality: Intersectionality, Environmental Justice, and Disaster Vulnerability

“…Although environmental inequalities persisted historically (Taylor 1997;, environmental justice was not utilized as an organizing concept until the 1980s, when African American communities, black scholars, and the progressive United Church of Christ began to draw attention to environmental inequities experienced in black communities (Mohai, Pellow, and Roberts 2009;Szasz and Meuser 1997). Developing shortly after the civil rights movement, Everett Parker and Robert Bullard pursued environmental injustice narratives around civil rights and the experiences of African Americans in the southern United States, which were largely left out of mainstream environmental movements (generally white, male, wealthy; see Taylor 2000).…”

“…The movement marks the first environmental discourse framed by people of color (Agyeman et al 2016). The classic case of environmental racism that spurred this movement was North Carolina's decision to dump soil contaminated with polychlorinated biphenyl in Warren County where the largest proportion of African Americans in the state resided (Geiser and Waneck 1983;Mohai et al 2009). As this issue garnered national attention, EJ activism and research began to develop in tandem.…”

“…EJ research has also developed critically and spatially, analyzing rural dimensions of environmental disparities (Malin 2015;Malin and DeMaster 2016;Pellow 2016;Roberts and Toffolon-Weiss 2001), the concept of community as an organizing principle for environmental controversies and injustices (Gunter and Kroll-Smith 2006), and utilizing EJ to understand environmental inequities transnationally (Faber 2008;Mohai et al 2009). EJ's advancement across these spatial dimensions creates an opening in the literature for a more contextual, intersectional understanding of the distribution of environmental goods and bads, such as sustainability, climate impacts, natural resource extraction, and waste and e-waste disposal (Agyeman et al 2016;Anand 2004;Carruthers 2008;Jamieson 2001;Pellow 2007;Schlosburg 2004;Smith, Sonnenfeld, and Pellow 2006).…”

“…Kurtz (2007) examines EJ and gender in Louisiana, and a handful of age-related analyses explore EJ in the context of children and the elderly (Cutter 1995;Evans and Marcynyszyn 2004;Landrigan, Rauh, and Galvez 2010;Stephens 1996). Methodologically speaking, the majority of research has focused on developing EJ through single variable analyses.3 When analyses do consider multiple outcomes as opposed to focusing on a single variable, they typically focus solely on race and class, analyze them as separate entities, and at times pit them against one another (Mohai et al 2009), which Bullard (1993) identified early on as the "race versus class trap." While we are learning more about interlocking systems of oppression, we must continue to advance EJ methodologies that are adequate for this theoretical approach.…”