Critical Stance

Environmental Justice
with a focus on Native
Americans

Ahtziri Carranza

May 2020
California State University Monterey Bay
ENSTU 412: Environmental Thought & Practice
Introduction

There is debate as to when exactly the environmental justice movement began. Some say
that it began in the 1960’s when the Farm Worker Association protested for farm worker rights
and to ban DDT as it was harmful towards workers. Others state that it began in the 70’s during
the Love Canal incident in which it was discovered that hazardous waste near a neighborhood
was causing health defects in the people of the community. However, it gained the most traction
in 1982, when reports released by the United Church of Christ revealed a link between
marginalized communities having a higher chance of being near hazardous waste sites (Wellock,
2007). People from the environmental movement and those who had been part of the social
movements in the 1960’s joined together to link the two. This discipline is used to fight against
injustices regarding people and environment, such as hazardous waste sites being near people,
poor air and water quality etc. However, some critiques of the movement include how it is often
seen as different from the environmental movement, how it seems to disadvantage Native
American people, and how its reliance on government is a setback. These emerged ever since the
movement was created and have been regarded as aspect of it that have not helped the movement
advance in regards to Native American people and their injustices.

Overview of the Field’s Evolution

1870-1910: Conservation and Preservation movements

The time period of 1870-1910 was the start of the Conservation and Progressive
movements. The conservation movement had ties to white supremacy, with notable figures such
as Theodore Roosevelt and Gifford Pinchot, fearing “race-suicide” due to the migration of
Eastern Europeans, who had more children compared to American people (Wellock, 2007). And
while middle to upper class white American males rejoiced in adding their savior complex to yet
another entity, the effects of colonization of Native Americans and the end of the Native
Americans were beginning to show. Their population went from about 18 million to only
250,000 thousand by the 1890’s. They lived in extreme poverty, had lost their land and had to be
relocated into reservoirs which were areas that were not wanted by white people. Their fishing
and hunting rights (about two-thirds of them) were taken away because not only did they have to
fight against agencies, but the Conservation and Preservation movements also had influence. The
members of the movements believed that the practices used by Native Americans were too
“damaging” on the Earth, so they fought to restrict them from having licenses to hunt. This
affected the livelihoods of Native Americans, as not only did they have to worry where their next

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“home” would be but they also had to worry as to how much sovereignty they would actually
have there (Taylor, 1997).

1920’s-1960’s- Great Depression & World War

Franklin Delano Roosevelt’s New Deal helped America during the time of the Great
Depression. For minorities, the creation of the Civilian Conservation Corps allowed for men to
have a job in which they would build parks connecting them to nature and providing them with
health and money. Even though there was segregation in the Civilian Conservation Corps camps,
it not only helped economically but established a sense of responsibility towards nature for these
men (Wellock, 2007). However, many Native Americans had the worse end during the
Depression. Land that was supposed to be allocated to them by the Bureau of Indian Affairs
(BIA) was instead given to rich white people who were struggling. During World War 2, Native
Americans helped by working in industrialized jobs that helped the economy because many of
the American men had gone to war. Native Americans were paid for their service by being fired
from those jobs once the men who had gone to war had returned. Through the Indian
Reorganization Act of 1934, Native Americans were given land with their own tribal
governments. But less than 20 years later, in the 1950’s, the Bureau of Indian Affairs removed
Native Americans from these reservoirs and got rid of the tribal government system and
relocated them once again (Taylor, 1997).

It is also important to note that during this time period, there was a rise in two important
Native American organizations. The first was the National Congress of Native American Indians
(NCAI), established in 1944 and the second was the American Indian Movement (AIM) which
was a direct response to the relocation of Native Americans done by the Bureau of Indian Affairs
in the 1950’s (Taylor, 1997).

1960’s-1990’s- Civil Rights & Warren County & Beginning of Enviornmental Justice

In the 1960’s, there was a rise in Native American movements which aimed to fight for
their rights, specifically land rights and sovereignty. Such organizations included the National
Indian Youth Council (NIYC), and the American Indian Movement (AIM). Notable events that
occurred during this time period include: The production of The Declaration of Indian Purpose,
which aimed to unite Native American tribes in the fight for sovereignty and their cultural rights,
the “fish-ins” held in 1970 in which they would set up fishing camps in protest to gain their
fishing rights back, and the landing of Native Americans on the abandoned island of Alcatraz
trying to reclaim their land under a treaty. These events, with the publishing of books such as
“Custer Died for Your Sins” and “Bury My Heart at Wounded Knee”, served as a catalyst for
Native American activism in their pursuit of justice (Taylor, 1997).

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 In 1982, white and African American people who resided in Warren County united to
protest the dumping of PCB-contaminated soil. They protested it because of the health effects it
could have on the community. Although they were not victorious in stopping the dump, they did
garner national attention, which brought in civil rights activist Benjamin Chavis. After he got
involved, he brought along his allies: The United Church of Christ. The United Church of Christ
released a report called Toxic Waste and Race which estimated that 60% of African American
and Latino communities were near a site in which toxic materials were being dumped. This
report called the attention of other people of color who joined the environmental justice
movement. Like environmentalists, they cared for the environment, but they had an
anthropocentric approach rather than a biocentric one. By the 1990’s there was a boom in
membership in the environmental justice movement, and they demanded for more people of
color to be hired in environmental organizations to have better representation and for the
environmental movement as a whole to also focus on issues affecting marginalized communities.
This created a shift in thinking for many environmentalists, who often would separate human
well-being and the environment as separate entities. This stemmed from different reasoning, but
one example was the thinking of EarthFirst! Who had a complete disregard to human well-being
because, to them, humans were the cause of all environmental problems and went as far to say
that the AIDS epidemic was a good thing because then the human population would diminish
(Wellock, 2007).

Contemporary Critiques

Social Justice & Environmentalism seen as exclusive

A critique in environmental justice is how difficult it has been to see the environmental
movement and social justice movement as the same rather than exclusive from one another.
Looking back at the history of how environmentalism came to be, it was often a movement only
for white middle class members of society. The social justice movement was the movement for
the marginalized groups fighting for their rights in society. Their belief systems and how they
advocated for themselves were different as well and how they were received. When minorities
fought for their rights, such as in 1970 when Native Americans had a “fish in”, they were met
with retaliation and violence from police and other members of the public (Taylor, 1997).
Whereas environmentalism did not receive that harsh of a treatment, sometimes they were the
ones participating in violent demonstrations such as EarthFirst!, who were notorious for being
extremists in their beliefs and how they advocated for them (Wellock, 2007). Another
contributing factor to this, that was present back then and today, is the labeling of what is
considered an environmental problem and what isn’t. Those labels are shaped by the

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environment and how people grew up. Someone who is middle class and went to national parks
during family trips may considered deforestation and conservation of animals as important
environmental problems and will advocate for that. While someone who grew up in a poor
community surrounded by toxic waste and deteriorating environment conditions will view that as
an environmental issue and advocate for that, while outside others may view it as a public health
issue instead. The divide in the living conditions of everyone and how well they are educated
continues to fragment the movement into two separate entities instead of labeling it under the
same umbrella (Wood, & Wakefield, 2012).

Environmental Justices practices is different for Native Americans

When it comes to “justice served” in environmental injustice, it is different among

marginalized groups. While in poor communities/ communities of people of color restitution to
an injustice may look like removal of a hazardous waste site or a relocation of the people’s
home, like in Love Canal, reparations for Native Americans is different. The difference stems in
the history between the United States and Native Americans. Often, reparations towards Native
Americans comes in the form of tribal sovereignty, which means tribes have the right to self-
govern. But even in these cases, it is not enough because many times these sovereign nations are
not economically powerful. Which means that when it comes to protecting their land or allowing
harmful practices to occur in the exchange for money, money will be chosen (Vickery, & Hunter,
2017). This leads to another topic that is often overlooked in environmental justice, which is the
emotional well-being of Native Americans. They see the land, plant, fish, and water as sacred
beings who they build relationships with and rely on for self-identity. The Earth is not their
property to be ruled over, it is like kin to them. Harmful impacts on the Earth affect them on a
deeper level than any other group. An example of this is research that was conducted on the
Karuk tribe of California and the deteriorating health of the Klamath River which they use to
hunt salmon. Members of the tribe would express grief, one member stating “It sort of gives you
a sense of slowly dying” regarding not being able to hunt for salmon in the river any more due to
the blooms and dam that were killing them. Because of the connections that Native American
people have with the Earth, it is argued that environmental justice should take a shift from
focusing on what is right and equal and instead focus on the caretaking responsibility we all have
with Earth (Norgaard & Reed, 2017).

Reliance on Government is a drawback

Time and time again it has been shown how the United States government choses
economic benefits and expansion over the well-being of its most vulnerable people. For example,
the cost benefit analysis is often used when something is being planned in order to assure that
there will be more benefits than costs. But using this technique means that areas in poor

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communities where there is less to lose and less resilience will always be chosen when it comes
to toxic waste sites or other harmful processes (Sandler, 2018). Also, throughout history we have
seen how easy it is for the United States government to have take-backs on land treaties, or any
treaties for the matter, when it comes to Native American lands. It is for these reasons that
government reliance for environmental justice issue is seen as a disadvantage in the movement.
Members from poor or remote tribes may not be able to contact government officials when they
want to oppose something, and even if they are able to contact them there is no guarantee that
they will be listened to. White privilege is very much present in this movement, which is
frustrating as works as a diminishing force for people who are trying to fight for their rights but
have to rely on others to speak for them (Wood, & Wakefield, 2012). Another critique to
government and environmental justice is how in the face of a changing climate, people now want
to listen to Native Americans and use their knowledge to save the Earth. However, it’s not as
easy as just picking up a book and reading about it and gaining knowledge; their knowledge is
gathered through their way of living. But before any of that can happen, there must be a
discussion as to how colonization has shifted the practices of Native Americans and how can
environmental justice be used to decolonize their practices. Of course, this is an area that the
government has no interest in engaging with and appears to only have interest in the knowledge
of Native Americans to further prosper in economic gain and not for reparation purposes
(Dhillon, 2018).

Analysis

Central features in environmental justice is that it has been a movement which has
allowed for minorities to become involved in the realm of environmentalism as it has been
proven with Love Canal and the United Farm Workers Association. Shifting times have resulted
in shifting problems, a big one now a days is how people are being affected by climate change.
Yet, through the environmental justice movement, people of all backgrounds can unite and fight
for their rights which was something that wasn’t done before due to movements being inclusive
of only certain members. However, the biggest divergence in the movement is how different the
battles of Native Americans are compared to other minority groups and how they are handled.
Latino, African American, Asian, and poor communities’ concerns within the environmental
justice movement is centered more on how environmental conditions affect them economically
or health wise. And while Native Americans also face those issues, a bigger one for them is how
colonization has affected their way of life and how the economic greed of the United States
continues to disregard them. Their battles within the movement are often regarding the health of
their rivers, for their rights to fish and hunt, and for the protection of their sacred lands. Because
not only do these factors affect their health and economy, but they also bear cultural significance
to them. While solutions for other minorities may include relocation or a shut down of a

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hazardous site, Native Americans want to have sovereignty over their territories, but years of
relocation and mistreatment from the United States makes it difficult to achieve for them. It is
like there is nothing that can be done within the environmental justice movement that will be
able to repair the injustices done to Native Americans.

My Position

A question I wanted to answer for myself is why do I keep on typing environmental

justice and environmentalism as if they were two different movements? I think my answer lies
within the first critique: because I view them as so. This stems from my own education and the
timeline in which I learned about each. When I learned about environmentalism, I learned of
animals dying, of deforestation, of the quality of our waters and that stuck with me throughout
the years. It wasn’t until university when I found out about how these issues can also impact
people too, creating an environmental justice issue. It’s difficult to just use environmentalism as
an overarching term because I feel like I need to add “justice” to it to let it be known that people
are being impacted too. But if I continue to do the separation of terms, I will only continue
contributing to the ideology that only certain people can go into one or the other.

I do agree with the critiques that the issues Native Americans face are different from
other groups within the movement and require different solutions. They were the first ones here,
but they had everything taken away from them. I don’t think there will ever be a way to make
that up to them. Even though the government has allowed for them to become sovereign states, it
is extremely difficult to handle being one. Their economy depends too much on the United States
government, and the government sure does like using up their resources, so it just creates a cycle
in which Native Americans keep getting negatively affected.

Through their activism they have had their wins but have also had their loses. As for me,
being someone who will be part of the environmental movement for the rest of my life, I think
the best thing that I can do is to stand with them and support them through their battles. The
future is unforeseen, but I sure do hope that we will get to a point in which more people of color
are taken seats in government positions, especially those who are Native Americans. While I
don’t think there is anything wrong in having White allies speaking up for us, I do think it is
more meaningful and impactful for those who are living through those experiences to speak up
and create solutions for their communities.

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Conclusion

Throughout the history of the United States there has been countless of injustices done
towards marginalized groups in the hands of those with power. However, the members of these
marginalized groups found ways to fight for their rights. Through the environmental justice
movement, people from all backgrounds have been able to unite and fight against injustices
related to them and the environment. There have been wins and losses, but this movement has
built a support system for many who thought they were alone. Even though it is not perfect and
has its criticisms, with more people joining the environmental movement and bringing in new
perspectives there is hope that one day it will be able to bring justice to all those injustices still
present today.

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Literature Cited

Dhillon, J. (2018). Introduction: Indigenous Resurgence, Decolonization, and Movements for

Environmental Justice. Environment and Society, 9(1), 1-5.
Norgaard. K, M., & Reed, R. (2017). Emotional impacts of environmental decline: what can
Native cosmologies teach sociology about emotions and environmental justice? Theory
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Sandler, L, R. (2018). Environmental ethics: theory in practice. Oxford. Retrieved from:
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Taylor, E. D. (1997). American environmentalism: the role of race, class, and gender in shaping
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Vickery, J, & Hunter, L, M,. (2015). Native Americans: where in environmental justice
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Wellock, T. R. (2007). Preserving the nation: The conservation and environmental movements,
1870-2000. Hoboken, NJ: Wiley-Blackwell.

Wood-Gibson, H, & Wakefield S., (2012). “Participation”, white privilege and environmental
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