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Environmental Justice

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Caliifornia State University, Dominguez Hills
University of Wisconsin, Parkside
Latest Update: August 23, 2001
E-Mail jeannecurran@habermas.org
E-Mail takata@uwp.edu

From a Justice Studies Perspective

Collaborative Journal Entry by jeanne

Review and Teaching Essay by Jeanne Curran and Susan R. Takata
Copyright: Jeanne Curran and Susan R. Takata and Individual Authors: August 2001. "Fair use" encouraged.

This essay started from the Hab list, where a discussion of Habermas and aesthetics was recently begun. Because of our concern for the importance of art as a tool for expanding the imaginary, I have been trying to keep up with this thread. It's been a little hard in the middle of the American Sociological Association Annual Meetings, so I was trying to catch up, and somehow ended up at the Umae University Library in Sweden. And there I found these entries on environmental justice.

Please note the importance of checking your URLs so you can retrace your steps, should you need to. I know it's hard, but it's essential if you're using the Internet for research.

I'll put up a teaching essay, shortly, I hope, on environmental justice as part of our studies on transforming discourse in the love and peace series of courses. Meanwhile, those of you with an interest in this thread might want to explore on your own.

jeanne, August 23, 2001.

Umeå University Library, Sweden
Environmental Justice Links

Miljöhistoria vid Umeå universitetsbibliotek Umeå University Library, Sweden.

In my search for environmental justice, I came across this bibliography. There are good summaries of books on the topic of environmental justice. I've included several for your perusal, in English, and suggest that you browse the site. There is an English guide. Link on the British flag.

We may not have time to cover as much as I'd like of environmental justice this semester, but for those of you interested in that thread, here's an interesting starting point, and one with a global perspective.

love and peace, jeanne. August 23, 2001.

  • Minding nature : the philosophers of ecology / edited by David Macauley. 355 s. 1996. Placering: uh 503
    "Combining philosophy, ecology and political theory, the book critiques and builds upon the ideas of such luminaries as Thomas Hobbes, Martin Heidegger, Ernst Bloch, Hannah Arendt, Herbert Marcuse, Barry Commoner, Rachel Carson and Jürgen Habermas, among others. Individually, these essays provide new perspectives on major philosophers and social thinkers."

  • Unequal protection : environmental justice and communities of color / edited by Robert D. Bullard. 1996. 392 s. Placering: uh 506
    "The book offers compelling evidence that pollution disproportionately impacts communities of color, subjecting citizens to toxic insults of the deadliest kind. Collecting the work of local activists, journalists, and educators, this volume is edited by Dr. Robert Bullard, one of the leaders in the nationwide fight for environmental justice. The essays chronicle the wake-upp call and emergence of grassroots activism in local communities and regions from Texarkana to Triana, Alabama, from Black Mesa, New Mexico, to West Dallas."

  • Worster, Donald: An unsettled country : changing landscapes of the American West. 1994. 151 s. Placering: k 8577
    "The West remains unsettled, both by cultural habits, intellectual debate and ecological conditions. In these four essays, comprising the Calvin P. Horn lectures in Westerrn history and culture, Donald Worster incisively discusses just how the natural environment has played an active, critical role in the making of the American West. His subjects are four linked topics: the legacy of John Wesley Powell to western resource management; the domination of water policy by state, science and capital since the mid-nineteenth century; the fate of wildlife in the push to settle the West; and the threat of global warming to the Great Plains."
  • Bahre, Conrad Joseph: A legacy of change : historic human impact on vegetation in the Arizona borderlands. 1991. 231 s.
    "The arrival of Anglo settlers in the 1870's marked the beginning of major vegetation changes in southeastern Arizona. While many of these changes have already been linked to human land-use through comparative photographs and historic descriptions, it has long been presumed that changes in the region's climate have also contributed to vegetation change. Conrad Bahre now challenges the view that these vegetation changes are due to climatic change. Correlating his own field research with archival records and photographs, he demonstrates that most of the changes follow some type of human disturbance, such as cattle grazing, fuelwood cutting, wildfire suppression, agriculture and road construction ... "

  • Knobloch, Frieda : The culture of wilderness : agriculture as colonization in the American West. 1996. 204 s. Placering: qd 726
    "In this work of cultural and technological history the author describes how agriculture functioned as colonizing force in the American West between 1862-1945. She uses agricultural textbooks, USDA documents and historical accounts of western settlement, and explores the implications of the premise that civilization progresses by bringing agriculture to wilderness. Knobloch shows how western land, plants, animals, and people were subjugated in the name of cultivation and improvement."

  • Conley, Verena Andermatt : Ecopolitics : the environment in poststructuralist thought. 1997. 188 s.

    "Ecopolitics is a study of environmental awareness - or non-awareness - in contemporary French theory. Arguing that it is now impossible not to think in an ecological way, the author traces the roots of today's concern for the environment back to the intellectual climate of the late 1950s and 1960s. Major thinkers of 1968, the author argues, changed the way we think of the world; this owes much to an ecological awareness that remains at the heart of issues concerning cultural theory in general. The book points to critiques of ecology in the work of Luc Ferry and Jean Baudrillard before turning to more complicated ecological awareness primarily in French thought. The author considers key texts by influential figures such as Michael Serres, Paul Virilio, Gilles Deleuze and Felix Guattari, Michel de Certeau, Helene Cixous and Luce Irigaray."