Environmental Injustice

Abstract

Since the 1970s, individuals, organizations, and some governments have been raising awareness about environmental preservation and conservation. From that time to the present, environmentalists have broadened their focus to include the intersection between social justice (race, gender, class)¹ how the rich and powerful expropriate and degrade the environment for profit, while disadvantaging low socioeconomic people on local and global levels. The expanded scope of environmentalism has also generated multifaceted disciplines that examine different aspects of the environment. Martinez-Alier argues that given the “value pluralism” that surrounds people’s views of natural resources, we can understand environmental injustice as being the result of unequal power, access, and distribution of natural resources.² By the 1990s, the field of environmental studies included political ecology, ecological economics, legal ecology, and feminist ecology.³ For instance, in Karnataka of South India, there are local politicians, rich farmers, and municipal government officials that tend to dispossess Siddi peasants and other citizens of villages and towns of their lands.