The environmental movement has made great strides since this day 39 years
ago, when Earth Day was first declared a holiday. Amidst the ebbs and flows
of public attentiveness for environmental concerns, legislation has been
passed and regulations implemented in cities, states, and the federal government
to protect our water, air, ecosystems, species, roadless areas, ocean health,
etc, etc.
And meanwhile, the public has come to care. One need only turn on the television or walk down the aisle of a Safeway to see products greening right before their eyes, and industries forming to respond - organic foods, energy efficiency, recycled products, even the fuel companies that power our energy use have taken to appealing to our heightened environmental consciousness. The environment has become trendy.
But neither our laws nor our alert consciousness is without blindspots.
In 2005, we all had a chance to see up close the uneven distribution of environmental degradation here in the US. The coverage of Hurricane Katrina took us for a brief moment into the realities of Cancer Alley, into the lower income - often minority - communities who must live next to petrochemical plants, incinerators, and municipal landfills, and the waste - and illness - that they produce. Katrina flooded that waste and showed us the toxicity that while everpresent, we seldom otherwise see. It showed us, for a fleeting moment, the voiceless: those who have time and again been overlooked by both our environmental movements and our environmental science.
Despite the efforts of those in the environmental justice community, neither the research questions we deem “most pressing” within the environmental sciences nor the issues we deem central to the environmental advocacy agenda address the uneven distribution of environmental impacts, health threats, or infrastructure weaknesses. In fact, in setting these agendas – both research and advocacy – the most vulnerable communities have been largely voiceless.
And as I say this, let me be clear, I am not referring to the agendas set in the board rooms of oil companies or the chemical industry. I am referring to the agendas set by ecologists, climatologists, and natural resource managers, by Environmental Defense, the Natural Resources Defense Council, and Greenpeace, by groups who care, who value environmental justice. Yet these questions still have not risen to the top in these past 39 years. Why?
Because the voices of the affected remain too quiet and too few. In the environmental sciences, habit and curiosity promote research into the climate system or the structure of ecosystems before they promote research on conditions and solutions for reducing vulnerability. Our research priorities are determined largely by the scientists who will research them and not by the communities they might affect. And as a result, they are not well aligned with the most acute needs and problems of vulnerable communities.
We are at a critical juncture however, as we, as a nation, ramp up our desire to involve stakeholders in our discussions and decisions about the environmental science research we will pursue. We have begun to engage the communities who are most affected by environmental concerns. We have begun to assess their needs and challenges. Yet our attempts thus far have had little impact on our research priorities. We do not know what to do with the stakeholder input that we get back.
This is our challenge. This will take work. It is not the model science prioritization has relied on for the past 50 years, and it requires a reworking of assumptions and habits – a reworking that our institutions are not wont to do. But if we do not assume this challenge, if we do not struggle with how to rework our assumptions and habits, 39 years from now, we are unlikely to be in a different spot. We are unlikely to have a more just environmental science agenda. We are unlikely to have removed this gaping blindspot.
Both the environment and stakeholder involvement are trendy at this moment. The choice is ours. Will we use this opportunity to give voice to the voiceless?
