Environmental Engineering Reference
In-Depth Information
that provide recognition, voice, and capacity to populations and groups
most at risk (see Adger et al. 2006). Addressing questions such as these
provides a means for understanding and fostering environmental and
social change. While they may not alter demand or break the cycle associ-
ated with the treadmill of production, the answers to these questions
provide new insights into how vulnerable individuals and communities
might come together alongside key transnational social movement and
nongovernmental organizations such as the Basel Action Network and
Greenpeace International, to develop what Faber (2008) and Pellow
(2007) characterize as an emergent transnational movement for environ-
mental justice.
Chapter Overview
The chapters in this topic demonstrate how spatial and multilevel insti-
tutional dynamics interact to shape the ways global inequalities play out
in local contexts. In particular, they integrate spatial and institutional
perspectives to examine how social and environmental inequalities propa-
gated by remote demand and consumption are constructed, understood,
experienced, and addressed. Toward this end, they are organized into
three thematic sections. Part I, “Consumption and the Rise of Inequalities
beyond Borders,” examines how consumption and production in distant
locales can undermine and threaten local environmental quality and
human rights. In chapter 2, Anguelovski and Roberts take consumption
and the emission of greenhouse gases in the global North as a starting
point for understanding the presence of environmental and social burdens
in Durban, South Africa. While they echo themes in the literature about
how climate change is contributing to inequities across countries, they
provide an in-depth assessment of how climate impacts further entrench
disparities within countries. In particular, they demonstrate the climate
inequalities faced by poorer and fragile residents in Durban and examine
how climate change is affecting the municipal goals of infrastructure
development, tourism expansion, poverty reduction, and sustainable
development. They conclude by discussing how Durban is responding to
spatial inequity through climate adaptation planning and implementation.
Inequities stemming from foreign demand for oil and gas form
the basis of chapter 3, by Stephenson and Schweitzer, who focus on the
environmental justice claims of the Ogoni peoples in response to
petroleum extraction in the Niger River Delta. While many accounts of
environmental degradation in the Delta are attributed to multinational
