Environmental Engineering Reference
In-Depth Information
ecologically and socially toxic forms of economic development that are
rampant throughout southern Africa.
The case of Livaningo also reveals how environmental inequalities
refl ect a type of sexual violence (Smith 2005), in the way that hegemonic
social forces attempt to either impose ecologically harmful practices or
extract ecological resources without the consent of affected communities.
In other words, Andrea Smith argues that—similar to traditional forms
of interpersonal sexual violence—environmental inequality involves a
violation of a social body without consent. Whether this involves dumping
hazardous wastes, locating a polluting industrial facility near residents,
or extracting natural resources, environmental inequalities around the
globe routinely involve the absence of community approval. Thus, envi-
ronmental justice must ultimately embrace an orientation that confronts
all forms of inequality and recognizes how capitalism thrives off of
hegemonies of humans over ecosystems, whites over people of color, the
rich over the poor, men over women, citizens over noncitizens, and het-
erosexuals over gay/lesbian/bisexuals/transgendered/queer communities.
Without integrating these systems of hierarchy into our analyses of the
problem, we will fall short of proposing viable solutions.
Discussion and Conclusion
The emergence of a transnational movement for environmental justice
and the case of Livaningo allow us to think through questions of social
hierarchy and the kinds of accountabilities and interdependencies that
constrain and enable social and political change from within vulnerable
communities. Here I wish to extend Guinier and Torres's “miner's
canary” model of a racial metaphor to examine the miner's canary as a
spatial
metaphor. When global South communities are the targets of
international environmental injustice (via hazardous waste dumping,
illegal waste trading, or resource extraction from the global North),
those spaces
and
the people who occupy them constitute the miner's
canary. Thus entire communities, nations, and regions are often viewed
as disposable or devalued by more privileged actors on the global stage.
When social movements mobilize to demand that imported toxics be
returned to their points of origin, the receiving nations of the global
North serve as a reminder that environmental racism—like racism, class,
and gender inequality more generally—threatens us all. This analysis
allows one to theorize and link the boomerang effects of racism, class
and gender inequalities, and social movements across international
