"Environmental justice or eco-justice, is a social movement to address environmental injustice, which occurs when poor and marginalized communities are harmed by hazardous waste, resource extraction, and other land uses from which they do not benefit."
Overview of grassroots organizing and activism in the environmental justice movement.
Environmental Justice: It refers to the effort to ensure that marginalized communities are not negatively impacted by environmental hazards such as pollution and climate change.
Community organizing: It involves the process of bringing people together to work towards a common goal in their local communities.
Advocacy and lobbying: It involves persuasive communications aimed at influencing policy makers to support a particular cause or issue.
Grassroots organizing: It involves organizing individuals and groups from the ground up to effect change on a local level.
Strategic planning and campaign development: It involves the process of developing and implementing a plan to achieve specific goals and objectives.
Coalition building: It involves bringing different groups working towards a common goal to work together and achieve change in a unified manner.
Direct action and protest: It involves engaging in nonviolent protests and demonstrations to raise awareness and pressure those in power to take action on an issue.
Community-based research: It involves engaging with community members to conduct research and gather data to shape policy and advocacy efforts.
Environmental racism: It refers to the disproportionate impact of environmental hazards on low-income communities and communities of color.
Intersectionality: It refers to the interconnectedness of social inequalities such as race, gender, and class, and how they impact environmental justice issues.
Direct Action: This is a form of activism that involves direct confrontation and protest, like sit-ins, blockades, or demonstrations.
Advocacy: Community-based activists raise awareness and advocate for environmental justice through public campaigns, lobbying, and engagement with policymakers.
Education: Activists provide information and educate the community about environmental justice issues through workshops, events, and other forms of educational programming.
Community Organizing: Community-based activists use organizing tactics to bring people together and build coalitions around environmental justice issues.
Litigation: Activists file lawsuits to challenge or prevent environmental injustices and to seek legal remedies for affected communities.
Information dissemination: Activists use social media and other digital tools to share information about environmental justice issues, and to mobilize a network of people around a shared cause.
Grassroots lobbying: Activists use grassroots lobbying to pressure elected officials or key decision-makers to create policy changes that address environmental justice issues.
Non-violent civil disobedience: Activists may engage in non-violent civil disobedience, such as sit-ins or blocking roadways, to draw attention to environmental justice issues and pressure decision-makers for change.
Media activism: Activists utilize various forms of media, such as blogs, podcasts, and video projects, to draw attention to environmental justice issues and raise awareness.
Service learning: Activists engage with and serve their communities through environmental justice projects that address specific community needs.
"The movement began in the United States in the 1980s."
"It was heavily influenced by the American civil rights movement and focused on environmental racism within rich countries."
"The movement was later expanded to consider gender, international environmental injustice, and inequalities within marginalized groups."
"The movement for environmental justice has thus become more global, with some of its aims now being articulated by the United Nations. The movement overlaps with movements for Indigenous land rights and for the human right to a healthy environment."
"The goal of the environmental justice movement is to achieve agency for marginalized communities in making environmental decisions that affect their lives."
"The global environmental justice movement arises from local environmental conflicts in which environmental defenders frequently confront multi-national corporations in resource extraction or other industries."
"Local outcomes of these conflicts are increasingly influenced by trans-national environmental justice networks."
"Environmental justice scholars have produced a large interdisciplinary body of social science literature that includes contributions to political ecology, environmental law, and theories on justice and sustainability."
"Environmental injustice, which occurs when poor and marginalized communities are harmed by hazardous waste, resource extraction, and other land uses from which they do not benefit."
"The movement began in the United States in the 1980s."
"The movement was heavily influenced by the American civil rights movement and focused on environmental racism within rich countries."
"The movement was later expanded to consider gender, international environmental injustice, and inequalities within marginalized groups."
"As the movement achieved some success in rich countries, environmental burdens were shifted to the Global South (as, for example, through extractivism or the global waste trade)."
"The movement overlaps with movements for Indigenous land rights and for the human right to a healthy environment."
"The goal of the environmental justice movement is to achieve agency for marginalized communities in making environmental decisions that affect their lives."
"Local outcomes of these conflicts are increasingly influenced by trans-national environmental justice networks."
"Environmental justice scholars have produced a large interdisciplinary body of social science literature that includes contributions to political ecology, environmental law, and theories on justice and sustainability."
"Exposure to environmental harm is inequitably distributed."
"As the movement achieved some success in rich countries, environmental burdens were shifted to the Global South."