The Discovery of Environmental Racism
The majority of the U.S. population is not aware of the problem of "environmental justice." Most people would not even know what the term means if they heard it. In this paper I will write about the discovery of "environmental racism" in the early 1980s and report what is known about it today. I will then argue that making the general public aware of the problem is a crucial step towards environmental justice.
The discovery of environmental racism can be traced to the plan of a new PCB (polychlorinated biphenyls) landfill in a predominantly black community in Warren County, North Carolina, in 1982. The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) gives the following "background information" on PCBs (1):
PCBs have significant ecological and human health effects including carcinogenicity (i.e., probable human cancer causing or promoting agent), neurotoxicity, reproductive and developmental toxicity, immune system suppression, liver damage, skin irritation and endocrine disruption. These toxic effects have been observed from both acute and chronic exposures to PCB mixtures with varying chlorine content. PCBs do not breakdown readily in the environment and are taken into the food chain by microorganisms. PCBs are then biologically accumulated and concentrated at levels much higher than found in the surrounding environment thus posing a greater risk of injury to human health and the environment than might be imagined.
The already poor and disadvantaged community considers the addition of a toxic waste dump unacceptable; residents oppose the landfill by organizing protests that "some have termed the largest civil-rights demonstration since the 1960s" (2). A following investigation, by the U.S. General Accounting Office (GAO), reveals that Warren County is not an exception: three out of the four major hazardous waste facilities in the South are located in poor, predominantly black communities. Among the participants of the Warren county protests is the United Church of Christís Commission for Racial Justice. This commission sponsors a national study, following the GAO investigation, to determine whether the pattern is a countrywide appearance. The report, commonly referred to as the "Church of Christ study," is the starting point for the professional scientific investigation of environmental racism. It takes into account several socioeconomic factors, such as average household income, average home value, and average proportion of minorities in communities with commercial toxic waste facilities. Statistical analysis of the data yields two main results: first, the proportion of minorities in communities with hazardous waste dumps is on average twice as high as in communities without them. Second, "race is the single best predictor of where commercial hazardous waste facilities are located" (3). The authors conclude that it was "virtually impossible" to account for this by means other than "environmental racism" (4). After the groundbreaking Church of Christ study numerous similar investigations are conducted. Many find comparable results and draw similar conclusions, but not all.
The complexity of the problem is such that it is difficult to draw definite conclusions from even the clearest statistical results. While the high correlation between health, race, and pollution is undeniable, cause and effect relationships remain quite ambiguous. The New England Journal of Medicine editorial "Privilege and Health ñ What is the Connection?" explains how seemingly definite information might still be skewed (5). The author Marcia Angell uses two well-known studies to exemplify her point. The first shows that childhood asthma is far more common among children whose parents smoke. The second finds that children exposed to high levels of lead tend to have lower IQs than those who are not. The intuitive conclusions are that passive smoking leads to childhood asthma and high lead levels reduce childrenís IQs. Angell demonstrates how this is not necessarily the case (5):
It is impossible to know whether the increased prevalence of asthma in the children of smokers is really because of passive smoking or because smokers are more likely to be poor and poverty itself is associated with a higher prevalence of asthma. [Ö] The children of well-educated parents are more likely to do well on IQ tests and are also less likely to be exposed to lead. Unless the parents' education is considered in research on this subject, then, it is impossible to know whether lead exposure affects IQ directly or whether the connection is through another correlate of socioeconomic status.
From this perspective, proving that a specific environmental condition is the cause of a specific health problem is almost impossible. Some of the variables that need to be considered might remain unknown. However, some statistics are so convincing that doubting their significance is simply ignorant. For example, denial of the existence of environmental racism is becoming harder and harder. A recent study in Michigan examines the communities around incinerators, the "pollution source most closely associated with detrimental public health" (6). A variety of new socioeconomic variables are included, yet race remains the factor most closely associated with proximity of incinerators.
On the whole, environmental health hazards are getting more attention from scientists, the public, and the media than ever before. Yet a connection between high occurrences of diseases among minorities and the high pollution levels of their communities is rarely considered. In a 1996 commentary on the development of environmental justice, Raquel Pinderhughes claims that there are merely five studies that did (7): Bryant and Mohai found in 1992 that the organ cancer rate was 17 times the national average near uranium mining areas in the Navajo Nation. In 1991, Gilbert studied the city with the most uncontrolled hazardous waste sites in the U.S., Memphis, Tennessee. Rates of cancer, chronic respiratory illness, as well as neurological disorders among non-whites were significantly higher than among whites. Also in 1991, Nadakavukaren discovered abnormally high rates of cancer and infant mortality in 150,000 almost exclusively non-white residents of a Chicago housing project, located near 153 identified hazardous waste landfills. The Center for Third World Organizing discovered in 1986 that contaminated groundwater and windblown fumes from an industrial dump in Lake Charles, Louisiana, had lead to unusual occurrences of eye irritation, nosebleeds, nausea, and cramps among the black residents of the area. Again in 1991, De La Pena uncovered that members of a predominantly Latino community in Tucson, Arizona, had an abnormally high rate of both adult cancer and severe neurological disorders in newborns. Toxins had been released into their drinking water supply by a nearby waste dump.
Why is it that again and again minority groups are the victims of environmental hazards? A key term that has come up in the discussion of environmental justice is NIMBYS, the "Not In My Backyard Syndrome." Those who have more education and political power are much more likely to protest against environmental hazards in their communities. And when they do, they are also much more likely to succeed. Companies tend to choose the way of least resistance. As Pinderhughes puts it (7): "minority communities are targeted for siting because they are poorer, less informed, less organized, and less politically influential."
The sociologist Robert Bullard could be considered the authority in the field of environmental justice. Like many experts he blames much of the problem on institutionalized racism. In his 1993 essay "Residential Apardheit in Urban America," Bullard examines why black and white communities are so strongly segregated in the first place (8). He claims that housing discrimination practices are a major factor. According to the Federal Financial Institutions Examination Council (FFIEC), home mortgage loans for blacks were rejected more than twice as often as for whites. The government ignores this discrimination in lending, and encourages segregation by practicing exclusionary zoning policies. Bullard concludes (8):
African Americans, no matter what their educational or occupational achievement or income level, are exposed to higher crime rates, less effective educational systems, high mortality risks, more dilapidated surroundings, and greater environmental threats because of their race. Institutional barriers make it difficult for many households to buy their way out of health-threatening physical environments. The development of spatially-differentiated metropolitan areas where African Americans are segregated from other Americans has resulted from governmental policies and marketing practices of the housing industry and lending institutions. Millions of African Americans are geographically isolated in economically depressed and polluted urban neighborhoods away from the expanding suburban job centers.
The reality that minorities have limited access to nice housing areas adds a new dimension to the problem. Land value will decrease when an environmental hazard is placed in a certain neighborhood. Housing in this neighborhood might originally have been unaffordable for members of minorities, but with the introduction of the environmental hazard this is likely to change. Thus, minority communities are not only more likely to be targets of environmental hazards, they are also more likely to move towards them.
Today, several government organizations deal with environmental justice. First and foremost, there is the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA). The EPAís mission statement is " To protect human health and to safeguard the natural environment ó air, water, and land ó upon which life depends" (1). Somewhere within this extremely broad realm of activity falls the interest of protecting minorities. To work against environmental racism, the EPA established the Office of Environmental Justice (OEJ) in 1992 and the National Environmental Justice Advisory Council (NEJAC) in 1993. The OEJís primary activity is providing technical assistance to universities, organizations, associations, local governments, and other government agencies (9). It also provides financial assistance to community-based organizations for their environmental justice projects. The NEJAC advises the administrator of the EPA on environmental justice matters (10). Another government agency concerned with environmental justice is the National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences (NIEHS). The role of the NIEHS is to study and minimize "the burden of human illness and dysfunction from environmental causes" (11). It also tries to bridge the existing communication gap between scientists and the communities they study. The NIEHS encourages and seeks input from minority communities for its research, as does the Office of Minority Health (OMH), another government organization (12). On February 11, 1994, President Clinton issued an executive order instructing all federal agencies to establish environmental justice as a national priority. It was the first time the problem had been acknowledged at the presidential level.
However, the government agencies are not doing their job well. EPA rules are enforced in such a way that they grant much less protection to minority communities than to white ones. The findings of a 1992 study by staff writers for the National Law Journal are shocking (13). In minority areas, penalties under environmental law are much lower. Abandoned sites take much longer to be placed on the National Priority List. Cleanup of identified sites begins much later. When cleanup does happen, the EPA more often than not chooses inferior methods, whereas in white areas the opposite is the case. All of these correlations exist only for race, not for income. By enforcing the law selectively in white communities and not in minority ones, the EPA is encouraging industry to continue its environmental racism.
How can progress towards environmental justice be made if even government agencies meant to enforce it do not? Hundreds of grassroots organizations and dedicated individuals continue to fight for their rights. In 1994, the Environmental Justice Resource Center (EJRC) was founded at Clark Atlanta University. Here Bullard and several colleagues seek to "assist, support, train, and educate people of color professionals and grassroots community leaders with the goal of facilitating their inclusion into the mainstream of environmental decision making" (14). Here there still exists some optimism and hope for change. Victories of grassroots organizations are usually won in long and tedious court cases. According to the EJRC, the most recent one occurred on October 17th (14):
After more than eighteen months of intense organizing and legal maneuvering, residents of tiny Convent, Louisiana and their allies forced Shintech Inc. to scrap plans to build a $700 million polyvinyl chloride plant in the mostly African American community. The decision came on Thursday, October 17, 1998, and was hailed around the country as a major victory against environmental racism. The driving force behind this victory was the relentless pressure and laser-like focus of the local Convent community.
Shintech planned to build a polyvinyl chloride plant in an area in which there are already a dozen such plants. The air pollution level there is already 450 times as high as the national average without the new plant! Now Shintech is applying for a permit in Plaquemine, Louisiana, instead, but the protesters are coming too. They do not want to see the plant built anywhere in Louisiana. Only four similar reports can be found in the EJRC, and only one of them seems as significant as the Shintech case. A local grassroots organization took the Michigan Department of Environmental Quality to court after it had issued a permit for a power station to emit 2.4 tons of lead per year in an "already overburdened African-American community" in May 1997 (14). The court prohibited the State of Michigan from granting further permits until its system of environmental protection has been reformed. This reform must include risk assessments, at the cost of the applicant, and a new "meaningful" public hearing process.
Every one of the EJRCs success stories involves organized protest and demonstrations by a large group of informed people from the local community. In the Shintech case, organizations from outside the community also played an important role. Greenpeace, the Louisiana Environmental Action Network, the Southern Christian Leadership Conference and the Tulane Environmental Law Clinic all became involved with the protests (15). However, I doubt they could have done anything, if there had not already been local opposition. I conclude from my research that the activism of affected communities is the one thing that has proven to be effective. It led to the discovery of environmental racism in Warren County in 1982, and it is celebrating its first victories in court today. If an entire community makes its voice heard, then the industry and government cannot help but listen. Whether the motivation is justice or saving face in front of the media, action will be taken. Poor underprivileged minority communities can fight the NIMBYS (Not In My Backyard Syndrome) with its own weapons. When each and every community becomes concerned and outspoken about environmental concerns, the industryís path of least resistance will change. My suggestion is to make it less cumbersome for companies to follow environmental laws, than to find ways around them at the expense of minority communities. At a government level this must involve making it easier for the industry to obtain building permits for areas where there is little pollution, than for areas that are already burdened. Raising the level of public awareness will also lead to more equal law enforcement. If the EPA has the entire nation looking over its shoulder (not just the National Law Journal), it will not be able to continue treating minority communities worse than white ones.
These changes require a much higher awareness of environmental racism than there is today. The number one priority of the environmental justice movement must be to educate the population as widely as possible. It is good to see that the mission statements of the OEJ and EJRC stress informing and educating. I consider it the single most promising route to achieving environmental justice as soon as possible.
1. Environmental Protection Agency (1998). Homepage. http://www.epa.gov/ (31 Oct. 1998).
2. Callahan, P.(1994). Environmental racism: When civil rights are used to protect more than individual liberty. Omni 16, 8. Retrieved October 31, 1998 from the World Wide Web: http://insite.palni.edu/
3. Mohai, P. & Bryant, B. (1992). Race, poverty, and the environment. EPA Journal 18, 6-8. Retrieved October 31, 1998 from the World Wide Web: http://insite.palni.edu/
4. United Church of Christ. (1987). Toxic waste and race in the United States. As quoted by Hockman, E. M. & Morris, C. M. (1998). Progress towards environmental justice: a five-year perspective of toxicity, race and Poverty in Michigan,1990-1995. Journal of Environmental Planning and Management 41, 157-177. Retrieved October 31, 1998 from the World Wide Web: http://insite.palni.edu/
5. Angell M. (1993). Privilege and health--what is the connection? New England Journal of Medicine 329, 126-127. [93288064] MEDLINE (31 Oct. 1998)
6. Hockman, E. M. & Morris, C. M. (1998). Progress towards environmental justice: a five-year perspective of toxicity, race and poverty in Michigan,1990-1995. Journal of Environmental Planning and Management 41, 157-177. Retrieved October 31, 1998 from the World Wide Web: http://insite.palni.edu/
7. Pinderhughes, R. (1996). The impact of race on environmental quality: An empirical and theoretical discussion. Sociological Perspectives 39, 231-249. Retrieved October 31, 1998 from the World Wide Web: http://insite.palni.edu/
8. Bullard, R. D. (1993). Residential apartheid in Urban America. Earth Island Journal 8, 35-36. Retrieved October 1998 from the World Wide Web: http://insite.palni.edu/
9. Office of Environmental Justice (1998). Homepage. http://es.epa.gov/oeca/oej.html (31 Oct. 1998).
10. National Environmental Justice Advisory Council (1998). Homepage. http://es.epa.gov/oeca/oej/nejac/ (31 Oct. 1998).
11. National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences (1998). Homepage. http://www.niehs.nih.gov/ (31 Oct. 1998).
12. Office of Minority Health (1998). Office of Minority Health Resource Center. http://www.omhrc.gov/ (31 Oct. 1998).
13. National Law Journal (1992). Unequal Protection: The Racial Divide in Environmental Law. As quoted by: Bullard, R. D. (1993). Residential apartheid in Urban America. Earth Island Journal 8, 35-36. Retrieved October 31, 1998 from the World Wide Web: http://insite.palni.edu/
14. Environmental Justice Resource Center (1998). Homepage. http://www.ejrc.cau.edu/ (31 Oct. 1998).
15. Markowitz, G. & Rosner, D. (1998). Pollute the poor. Nation 267, 8-9. Retrieved October 31,1998 from the World Wide Web: http://insite.palni.edu/