The Environmental Justice Movement - Essay Example

The Environmental Justice Movement The Environmental Justice Movement The Environmental Justice Movement is one of the various types of social movements. A social movement refers to a group of individuals or organization with a common ideology. This group of persons works in unity to achieve certain common goals. The social movement in question can be referred to as a reform movement since it advocates for changes in some activities that happen in the country. This is because it addresses the issue about geographical and racial imbalance in the treatment of the citizen of the United States of America. Social movements have led to many political and social changes globally. The Environmental Justice Movement has the main agenda of challenging the unfair distribution of hazardous, toxic, and dangerous waste product. The waste facilities mostly had their location in areas whose occupants are the low-income communities, the colored people, and the minority communities. The Adherents for the movement include, Latinos, Native Americans, Pacific Islanders, African Americans, and Asians. The formation of this movement was in the year 1982, but such activities are believed to have started much earlier with people like Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King in the 1960s. The environment justice movement was officially started in the year 1982 after the decision by the government to have a waste landfill in the Warren County, North Carolina. The town in question was Shocco Township, which was supposed to host 30, 000 cubic yards of a hazardous waste known as polychlorinated biphenyl. About 70% of the occupants of this town were non-white with more than 20% of them having incomes of below the poverty level. In 1987, there were two studies proving that there was environmental racism in the United States of America (Sandler & Pezzullo, 2007). These two reports increased the urge of the movement members to fight for environmental justice. The first National People of Color Environmental Leadership Summit took place in the year 1991. The summit attendees were over 650 national and grassroots leaders representing over 300 environmental groups. In October 2002, there was the second National People of Color Environmental Leadership Summit. The strength of The Environmental Justice Movement is because of the close partnership between community-based organizations and university researchers. This is because Local groups have knowledge of neighborhood environmental issues while the university researchers have contributed by bringing their analytical, scientific, and legal expertise (Sandler & Pezzullo, 2007). The Emergency Planning and Community Right-to-Know Act was another relevant development with relation to the movement. The act was passed in the year 1986. Its main aim was to inform citizens on the dangers of chemical emergencies that could arise from nearby facilities nearby facilities. Despite these policy changes, criticism to the federal government by members of The Environmental Justice Movement did not decrease as the government was doing very little about this act. In terms of human resources, The Environmental Justice Movement highly depends on their volunteer members and their affiliated university groups. With this, they have services ranging from intellectual to manual services (Goodwin & Jasper, 2009). They mainly get their funding from the constituent environmental organizations. These organizations include the United Church of Christ’s Commission for Racial Justice, The United Methodist Church’s Department of Environmental Justice, the National Council of Church’s Eco-Justice Working Group, Southwest Network for Environmental and Economic Justice and many others. The philanthropy of these organizations avails continuous fund for the environmental justice movement. This satisfies the resources mobilization theory of social movements that sates that all social movement requires various resources for their operations. In 1991, they earned about some US dollars from the legal suit involving the lead-blood test on 557,000 children in California. The movement has therefore, occasionally benefited from lawsuits which further boosts their finances. These resources have continuously contributed to the development of The Environmental Justice Movement over the years. The Environmental Justice Movement could not depend totally on the resource they get from their adherents. The movement has continuously had financial support from non-member and well-wishers. The movement having member mostly from the low-income population, the challenge of financial hardships are a major one. However, this hardship is less because of the financial supports they get from the non-members. This helps the smoothly carry out their activities with little strains for finances. The Environmental Justice Movement members believe that they have been deprived their right to a healthy environment in order to favor the white-Americans and the rich (Sandler & Pezzullo, 2007). This is because of the high number of environmental pollutant facilities geographically situated in the area in which they reside and work. The members also believe that they were victims of discrimination in terms of resource allocation. They argue that the ratio of resource allocation is bias in terms of race and financial capability. They also differ with the federal government in the way they allocate health resources. They say that health facilities in their neighborhood have poor equipments and understaffed. Some of the constituent organizations have opted for specialization. This is because of the high number of involved organizations (Goodwin & Jasper, 2009). With this, the organizations make sure that they look into a specific problem in details. This reduces the risk of the movement focusing on one problem while putting little emphasis to the other problems. A perfect example of this is the Center for Health Environment and Justice. This organization mainly deals with health issues affecting the minorities. Despite this specialization, the organization is still a member of the large environmental justice movement. There are many other adherent organizations handling, pollution, working conditions and other problems addressed by the environmental justice movement. This has highly increased the number of adherents to the environmental justice movement. The Environmental Justice Movement member also believes that there was a violation of their social rights by the government. This is in respect to Karl Marx’s mass society theory, which argues that social movements consist of people in large societies who feel socially detached, or insignificant (Goodwin & Jasper, 2009). This is evident in the nature of the social lives of the adherents of the environmental justice movement. Karl Marx also has another theory, Social strain theory that highly applies in this social movement. The members of this movement join the movement because of the belief that their society has a problem. These problems mainly relates to the living and working conditions that the minor and poor citizens experience. The movement also proposes a solution to the social ills that they are facing. Just as, Marx say in his theory; the movement was catalyzed by the waste landfill in the Warren County, North Carolina. According to the value added theory of social movements, The Environmental Justice Movement was a result of the six factors that a social movement requires to exist (Goodwin & Jasper, 2009). The geographical closeness of the affected population was a contributor as it led to the existence of a common problem. This is an enhancing power in terms of massive human resource mobilization. Another contributing factor was the discomfort in the society due to poor living and working environments. The course also get boosting from the common believes of the adherent that they also deserved to live and work in conducive environments. This really helps, as it was the driving factor of the movement. The incident that took place in Warren County, North Carolina also acted as a catalyst to the environmental justice movement. The rise of The Environmental Justice Movement can also be highly associated to the social control structure to ensure environmental and racial balance. This is because most of the movement’s problems arise from lack proper social control The Environmental Justice Movement mainly advocates for justice in the treatment of all geographical places in the United States of America. They have taken to court several successful lawsuits including the one to oppose the development of a waste facility in 1979 (Sandler & Pezzullo, 2007). In this case, they emerged victorious with the court ruling in their favor. They have initiated various society upgrading programmes like “the leader in environmental action” which they used to address the social and environmental justice concerns in four communities. For example, the Blackmon Road community, in Rock Hill, received a complete water infrastructure lessons and were participants in community development training. The way in which The Environmental Justice Movement frames their communication plays a significant role in their growth (Goodwin & Jasper, 2009). Before the demonstration in the Warren County, North Carolina, there was no demonstration on environment discrimination that was successful. This would mean that the previous means were not effective. The demonstrators were relentless despite the arrest of about five hundred of them. They also went further and involved civil right leaders and religious leaders in their demonstrations. This further added weight to their demonstrations as it increased the number of sympathizers. Despite the demonstrations not yielding it primary goals, it was useful as its development because 20 years later the government saw to the clearance of the dumpsites. This was because of the network of environmental justice adherents that arose from this peaceful demonstration’s influence The environmental justice main goal was to make sure that all the citizens living the United States of America get equally treatment to the rights to live and work in conducive environments (Sandler & Pezzullo, 2007). They have been able to achieve this goal to some extent. The researches that the supportive universities carry out play a truly significant in the success of the movement. The movement always uses the findings in the researches to back their lawsuits and protests. Their members have also been available during their protests. This plays a significant in communicating their problems to the relevant authorities. The two national summits they have had also aids in increasing solidarity of it members. This is because they get to understand the problems and steps taken so far by the individual groups. The level of democracy in the United States of America also helps in the growth of this movement. They have always exercised their freedom of expression with minimal interruption by the government (Sandler & Pezzullo, 2007). The availability of reliable means of communication also plays a significant in the day-to-day operation of the movement. The movement has a website, which it uses for passage of information amongst the member. This means that any adherent can follow the proceedings of the movement regardless of his or her geographical location. There has also been minimal influence from the agents of social control thus making the operation of the movement easy. The Environmental Justice Movement has had its share of challenges. The movement has had problems with their operations because of lack finance. Having it in mind that the movement’s members are mostly the little earner, it is therefore, likely that they had it hard in financing their operations (Sandler & Pezzullo, 2007). The movement also suffers due to the government’s lack of commitment in solving their problems. Despite the movement having been involved in activities that aim at making sure all United States of America citizen get equal treatment In terms of resource allocation, very little has been done by the federal government. This clearly shows the government’s lack of commitment in solving these problems. The Environmental Justice Movement can be said to be one of the most fruitful social movements in the United States of America. This can be proved by the level of their accomplishments; they have been able to win several environment related lawsuits. The movement has also had various successful environmental upgrade programmes. Constant growth is another success of The Environmental Justice Movement. Many social movements start but are not able to exist for long because their poor organization. This movement has continuously grown despite its numerous activities. The movement, just as any other human activity has also had its failure, despite being in existence for more than 20 years, the movement has been unable to achieve all its goals. The environmental justice move is a success in improving the social status of the marginalized communities in the United States of America. References Sandler, R. D., & Pezzullo, P. C. (2007). Environmental justice and environmentalism: The social justice challenge to the environmental movement. Cambridge, Mass: MIT Press. Goodwin, J., & Jasper, J. M. (2009). The social movements reader: Cases and concepts. Chichester, U.K: Wiley-Blackwell. Read More