Environmental Justice I

Market liberals

econ. growth is essential to human welfare
production + consumption creates higher incomes
poverty causes people to exploit natural resources
solution: market based tools (cap and trade)

Institutionists

need stronger institutions and norms for managing common resources
environ. degradation comes from weak governance structures and lack of global cooperation
globalization is essential to foster environ. cooperation
solution: strong global institutions + cooperative norms + collective action in the face of uncertainty

Bioenvironmentalists

biological limits of the earth to support life
population growth and overconsumption is the problem
bc of globalization western consumerism spreads to fragile ecosystems
solution: curb economic + population growth

Social Greens

environ. destruction is tied to social injustice, unequal power dynamics & human exploitation
industrialism, capitalism, neo-colonial structures, overconsumption by rich, impoverishing of the poor
globalization accelerates inequality
solution: dismantling global structures, self-reliant economies & empowering marginalized voices

Mainstream environmentalism is built on…

white, western european & euro-american voices
African American voices are missing and invisible
fail to account how race, history, and power dictate access to land and environmental institutions

Why is African American’s identity from the outdoors different

not because of a lack of interest, but rather bc of a complex history shaped by forced labor, violence, exclusion, resistance

Racialization of white wilderness

popular media (nat geo) reinforce stereotypes by depicting nature + outdoor recreation as strictly white

Collective memory

For A.A collective memory of racial trauma and resilience shapes how green spaces are received / claimed (ex. important historical sites)

Landscapes of exclusion

Geographical arrangements implicitly / explicitly exclude A.A (ex countryside implicitly excluded black people)

Cultural trauma

“traumatic tear” of a group bc of historical horrors (ex slaver, lynching) requires re-narrating the past to reconcile present identities

Cognitive maps

shifting memories and ideologies through which people can determine where they feel safe / welcome

Historical context (3 points)

“forty acres and a mule” - denied land ownership and the land was returned to the former white owner
lynching - trees and forests became symbols of racial violence and terror
sundown towns - enforced racial segregation after dark, creating fears of travelling through white areas

Case studies

Virginia Key beach - provided a safe space for black floridians after a “wade-in” at a white only beach, restoration centered ancestral memory and community healing
Mavynee Bestsch - Bestsch protected the beach, encorporating it into the national park system

Race is a ….

social construct & racial categories can shift over time, political economy, and place

Critical race theory (three parts)

Racialization - grouping people by racial identity, stereotype, or quality
Racism - feelings of superiority over these fake groups (intentional & structural)
Environ. Racism - race accounts for disproportionate environmental harms

The idea of intersectionality

Crenshaw - the overlapping forms of oppression and identity formation (ex black queer women face intersecting oppressions)
Intersectionality of issues and material challenges (health, housing, food access)

Feminist theory and intersectionality

The Combanee Collective showed the importance of the simultaneity of oppressions”

African Americans & relationship with nature the history (3 points)

Worked land as enslaved people
developed knowledge of planting, foraging, agriculture, and stewardship of the land
even food finds their roots in the era of slavery

Post Civil-War era

forty acres and a mule - short-lived promise that symbolized black land ownership and freedom and its betrayal shows how white supremacy reasserted itself during reconstruction

Land not evenly distributed caused?

sharecropping and tenant farming = impoverished black farm owners
Increase of jim crow laws (KKK, black codes, migration)

Racial terror + the outdoors

lynching & KKK = collective memory of trauma
strange fruit

Black faces, white spaces (3 points)

social construction of wilderness is grounded in whiteness
A.A have a conflictual relationship with the environment but we don’t know much about it bc of dominant forms of environmental knowledge
“Collective memory” - how people’s cognitive maps of the past are used to orient their behavior in the present

Bioenvironmentalists

over population is the problem -> reduction in population will preserve nature from human interference

Market liberals

market needs to adjust to scarcity -> market mechanisms will solve the problem, if not the coase theorem will (low transaction costs & clear property rights)

Institutionalists

ToC are weak when institutions are weak -> strengthening them will solve the problem

Social greens

unequal power + historical legacies (racism, imperialism) are the problem -> reducing inequality / implementing social and environmental justice / including racial diversity in env movement will solve the problem