What is Environmental Justice?
How does one define environmental justice? There is no single, accepted definition (for a broader discussion of definitions, see the sidebar on the right), but a working definition provided by the United States Environmental Protection Agency is helpful. According to the EPA, environmental justice is
"the fair treatment and meaningful involvement of all people regardless of race, color, national origin, or income with respect to the development, implementation, and enforcement of environmental laws, regulations, and policies. Fair treatment means that no group of people, including racial, ethnic, or socioeconomic group should bear a disproportionate share of the negative environmental consequences resulting from industrial, municipal, and commercial operations or the execution of federal, state, local, and tribal programs and policies."
Just as there is no single definition, there is no specific founding point for the environmental justice movement. As described by Luke W. Cole and Sheila R. Foster in their book, From the Ground Up: Environmental Racism and the Rise of the Environmental Justice Movement:
Many observers point to protests by African Americans against a toxic dump in Warren County, North Carolina, in 1982 as the beginning of the movement. The sociologist Robert Bullard points to African American student protests over the drowning death of an eight-year old girl in a garbage dump in a residential area of Houston in 1967. Others note that the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. was traveling to Memphis to support striking garbage workers in what is now considered an environmental justice struggle when he was assassinated in 1968. The United Farm Workers' struggle against pesticide poisoning in the workplace, beginning in the 1960s (and continuing to this day), is the starting point for some. Some Native American activists and others consider the first environmental struggles on the North American continent to have taken place 500 years ago with the initial invasion by Europeans. (pages 19 and 20, footnotes omitted)
Still others, no doubt, have their own starting point, but in modern times, at least, the environmental justice movement was largely created through the fusion of two other movements — the economic analysis of the anti-toxics movement and the racial critique of the civil rights movement — and the over-arching perspective of a third — faith. Other strong contributions have come from academia, from Native Americans, and the labor.
See the sidebar on the right for significant milestones and a timeline.
Some refer to environmental justice primarily as a form of racism. However, as much as the environmental justice movement has highlighted its connection to peoples and communities of color, as seen below, we at EnviroJustice believe that environmental justice applies to and is a matter of concern for all people, and all of its victims regardless of color or race. Race matters, it is no doubt true, but there is more to environmental justice than just issues of race. And, of course, at EnviroJustice we emphasize and celebrate the faith-based component of environmental justice.