Parth Raman/ Bella Girthofer
There have been many cases of racism throughout the world but the concept of environmental racism is a lot different and an emerging and widespread issue that needs to be addressed and a remedy suggested. Environmental Racism refers to a practice by which the minority communities of the world are ignored and are forced to live in an area that is surrounded by industrial or toxic materials, industrial waste factories, landfills, and other polluting sources. In other words, minority groups, such as coloured people, are discriminated against, and the environment around where they liveis generally toxic, surrounded by industries or waste disposal facilities. The policies are often discriminated against them. The word “Environmental Racism” was first used in the United States but now it is used worldwide as cases are increasing daily. “Environmental Racism” was coined in 1982 by Benjamin Chavis, previously executive director of the United Church of Christ (UCC) Commission for Racial Justice. Chavis defined the term as racial discrimination in environmental policymaking, the enforcement of regulations and laws, the deliberate targeting of communities of colour for toxic waste facilities, the official sanctioning of the life-threatening presence of poisons and pollutants in our communities, and the history of excluding people of colour from the leadership of the ecology movements. During the civil rights moments, environmental racism started to gain critical attention and people began to get concerned about their residential areas or neighbourhoods and this led to the beginning of the demand for Environmental Justice. No one wants landfills, industrial waste, dumping of wastes, etc., around their residential colonies but the majority of these policies in the US were against the people of colour and. Therefore,a majority of the landfills were concentrated near areas where the Latino-Americans, African-Americans or low-income groups are housed. Civil rights moments and Environmental Justice joined hands and impacted the United States immensely. People become more concerned about their living environment. The environmental justice movement became a huge protest movement and people from minority communities started to fight for their rights. The Environmental Justice movement started to gain strength during the presidency of Bill Clinton. There have been many cases of environmental racism in the United States, where 70 per cent of the population lives near waste or dumping lands. It can be said that a major portion of contaminated sites exist inthe low-income neighbourhoods. “Cancer Alley” is the most polluted area of the United States and it lies along the famous Mississippi River, affecting mainly the communities of colour. Environmental Protection Agency surveysshow that non-white Americans mostly face air pollution from industries, oil fumes, smog, etc. They cause problems of the heart, lung cancer, asthma, and other non-communicable diseases because of inhaling poor quality of air. The National Centre for Environmental Assessment's scientists confirmed that the African Americans in the United States face 1.5 times more dust particles or poor air quality than white people. At present, it is considered that race and not poverty alone should be considered as the main variable for studying environmental effects on poor communities. Surveys have been showing since 1983 that only 25 per cent of the wastelands are constructed near where white Americans live while the rest come up near the housing projects of minority communities. In 1990, many environmental justice leaders signed a public petition against the 10 big environmental groups for racial bias in policy development and the presence of only whites on their boards. This led to some of these organizations including people of colour or the poor in their workforce. Continued pressure led to the creation of the US Office of Environmental Equity.
(Parth Raman is Faculty, ICRI Group and Bella Girthoferis Researcher, International Relations and Peace. The views expressed are personal.)
