To what extent does the environmental justice movement,
both in ideology and action, challenge the discourse and
practice of social injustice, particularly racism?

Veronica Carbajal

I chose to answer this question through ethnographic research because environmental justice belongs to those who live it.

Qualitative Methods Used:

• participant observation
• in-depth interviews
• collection and review of documents, multi-media, and other artifacts

My research focused on the ideologies and work of Chicanas in the Texas environmental justice movement. This involved analyzing the work of three organizations:

• Casa de Colores: a center for indigenous thought and culture in Brownsville
• People Organized in Defense of Earth and Her Resources (PODER): a community-based organization that seeks environmental, economic, political and social justice in Austin
• Save our Spring (SOS): a mainstream environmental organization that seeks the legal protection of the Barton Springs Creek in Austin

Themes revealed in my findings:

• environmental justice is an extension of the civil rights movement, grounded in politics of racial and ethnic identity and the quest for social and racial justice
• Chicana involvement in these organizations stems from an indigenous understanding of womanhood and the environment and from their lived experience with injustice (racial, patriarchal, and economic)
• the wedge between the environmental justice and mainstream environmental movement is driven by internal and external forces

Conclusion:

Environmental justice contextualizes environmental problems in the political, social and economic system (s) which cause their proliferation. As such, the movement seeks both environmental solutions and changes in the prevalent and dominant power structure. The movement raises questions about positionality and white privilege, particularly in reference to the co-optation of the movement by outside interests. As such, the emphasis placed on racial and ethic identity reflect the movement’s stance on self-determination : “We speak for ourselves.”

Chicanas environmental justice organizers/activists work to hold the political, legal and economic systems accountable for the environmental degradation they introduce to socially and economically marginalized communities. Their indigenous identity and spirituality guides their work in search for a balance that will heal Mother Earth and all her inhabitants. Their work challenges racism, patriarchy, and classism.

The points of contention between the environmental justice and mainstream environmental movements stem from their difference in positionalities and racial privilege, as these are reflected in their environmental vision and agendas. Environmental justice challenges the myopic vision behind some mainstream environmental agendas, because what may appear to be an “environmental solution,” such as recycling, may be an industrial hazard to those who have to live next to it. Furthermore, alliances between the two movements must be analyzed with caution, based on the question, “Who Benefits?” Alliances must also recognize and work against the outside interests (political, business, private) that oppose environmental protection and work to solidify the wedge between the two movements.