Eco-Justice: How Environmentalism and Social Issues Intersect

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   The synthesis of topics seemingly unrelated to each other is always sure to produce something interesting, and at most, something deeply innovative and impactful. Forming connections between unrelated topics can create new, unique ways to seek justice. Justice-centered environmentalisms come from these kinds of combinations, bringing together the drive for social equity with the mission of preserving the earth. They are based on the idea that the struggles of marginalized people are directly connected to the man-made threats faced by the earth and, at times, caused by the same forces. 

     Ecofeminism, a foundational social environmentalism, emerged in the 1970s, mostly in Western academic circles, as exactly what it sounds like: a merging of feminism and ecology. It was established in order to examine the relationship between humans and the environment through gender, drawing parallels between the treatment of women under the patriarchy and the damaging treatment of the earth by humans. Ecofeminism is concerned with binaries – man/woman, nature/human, self/others. It theorizes that the view of the environment as something separate from humans presents it as either an obstacle to be conquered or a resource to be exploited, similar to how women have been subjected to domination and exploitation under white patriarchy. However, critics of ecofeminism point out the lack of consideration of factors such as race and class, and due to these connotations the term fell out of circulation by the 21st century. 

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     In its place, however, theoretical spaces emerged that drew upon ecofeminist theory, but also examined factors such as race & class and emerging technologies in depth. An example of this can be seen in the work of Dr. Chelsea Mikael Frazier, an assistant professor at Cornell University who works “at the intersection of Black feminist literature and environmental humanities”, according to her biography on the Cornell website. She works in ecocriticism, making connections between culture, art and the environment in order to analyze the historic relationship between Black women and the environment, including their contributions to environmental movements. Women of color have often been the ones leading the fight against environmental destruction, organizing to create change within their communities, but have been consistently underrepresented and ignored within these wider movements. Frazier’s work, among that of others, includes reckoning with these exclusions in the historical narrative of environmental movements. 

Though connections can be drawn to theoretical concepts, feminist organizing around environmental causes has often existed separately from academic spaces. Regardless, many examples can demonstrate how race, class, gender, and the environmental issues faced by marginalized groups all intersect in the real world. 

The Mothers of East LA, or MELA, was founded in 1986 by a group of Latina women who opposed the construction of a state prison in East Los Angeles. Many members of the predominantly Chicano neighborhood were furious upon hearing about the plans, fearing the implications for the community. Forming an opposition, the women of MELA lobbied in community and district meetings and led protest marches, wearing white scarves on their heads, and eventually the prison plans failed to pass when they were up for a vote in 1991. The group didn’t stop there, either. Though they were a group made up primarily of mothers, they weren’t just concerned with their children, but the future generations of their community. Throughout the 1990s and 21st century, they ran health education campaigns, raised money for scholarships, created mass demonstrations to educate on environmental justice, and participated in community and legal hearings. 

Around the same time of MELA’s inception, the Greening of Harlem Coalition in New York City was started in 1989 by Bernadette Cozart, a Black queer botanist and activist concerned with the lack of greenery in her predominantly Black urban neighborhood. Her goal was to regenerate Harlem’s urban spaces, creating green spaces that would serve the community and allow it to experience natural beauty in everyday locations. With this in mind, the group worked to transform vacant lots into community gardens, plant gardens in public school play areas, and all the while working with other community groups to achieve these aims. In a quote from a piece by the New York Times, Cozart said about her work, “Instead of taking children on field trips to see farms and gardens, why not bring nature into the community? I don’t think it’s fair that they should have to go outside the community to have that experience of seeing things grow.” 

The legacy of groups like MELA and the Greening of Harlem Coalition remains in many urban communities, where it’s more common to see community gardens and open green spaces than ever before. There’s often an assumption that change for underserved communities comes exclusively from voting or political representation, but these radical grassroots efforts serve to demonstrate that community organizing and building connections are just as, if not more, important and powerful. Eco-justice isn’t just about organizing or theory on their own, but both in tandem with each other–it’s key to examine the world and analyze what you see before you go out and take action. Ecological social theory is just one example of the intersections of our world’s injustices, but it’s a great primer for thinking about them, and once armed with this knowledge, it’ll soon emerge that not only are these intersectional injustices all around us, but we can all do something about them too, in our own ways, big or small.