Systematic Racism and Environmental Justice: An ABA Black History Month Discussion
By Sarah Brusseau
Image: "File:The Scales of Justice above the streets of Hong Kong.jpg" by Scotted400 is marked with CC0 1.0
This blogpost is in collaboration with the Sustainable Development Strategies Group (https://www.sdsg.org). It is the first of two posts detailing lectures from the ABA Section of Civil Rights and Social Justice’s Black History Month series.
On February 3rd, 2021, the ABA Section of Civil Rights and Social Justice hosted a program titled When Race and the Environment Collide: The Impact of Systematic Racism on Environmental Justice. The goal of the program was to examine the impact of structural and systematic racism on the environment; topics included the water crisis in Flint, Michigan and the consequences of Trump’s southern border wall. The program contained an exceptional group of panelists, all with diverse backgrounds and experiences within the realm of environmental justice and climate change.
The American Bar Association (ABA) has announced its commitment to the Black Lives Matter movement and reaffirmed its commitment to diversity, inclusion, and social justice within the legal system. Each year to celebrate Black History Month, the ABA honors Black Legal Trailblazers, puts on a 21-Day Racial Equity Habit-Building Challenge, and provides lectures and programs on social justice and civil rights issues.
Barry Law Professor Nadia Ahmad, who received her LL.M. in Environmental and Natural Resources Law from DU, began the lecture by explaining there is strong link between migration, climate change, environmental justice, and mass incarceration (transcript for program available here). The impacts of climate change, i.e., severe weather conditions, displacement due to rising sea levels from carbon emissions, and environmental pollution, have led to an increase in migration. And an increase in migration and immigration rates has, in fact, led to an increase in police brutality.
A powerful statement from Professor Ahmad detailed how the arrest of rapper 21 Savage in 2019 and the removal of Mississippi meat packing workers by ICE are not isolated events, but rather part of the “wider net of mass incarceration used to silence environmental, labor, and human rights as well as denying access to protection from environmental impacts.” Marginalized communities often live in areas where it has been deemed there is less of a need for clean water, air, and energy. The extreme heating and cooling patterns, and weather events, from climate change have actually impacted prison conditions; heat-related illnesses are at an all-time high and prisoners are not receiving the care they need. In 2018, 3000 prisoners were transported to a facility without running water when Hurricane Michael hit Florida.
So what is Professor Ahmad’s solution? Renewable clean energy, abolishing prisons, especially all private prisons, and eliminating immigration and customs enforcement.
Lindsay Heck, an associate at White & Case LLP, and Jeremy Orr, Senior Attorney with the Natural Resources Defense Council’s (NRDC) Safe Water Initiative, discussed the water crisis in Flint, Michigan. Flint is a prime example of all of the forces Professor Ahmad discussed (climate change, environmental justice) coming together with systematic racism. Heck stated the Flint water crisis was really “fueled” by government policy. The decision to save money and source Flint’s water from the acidic, sewage filled Flint River, led to lead poisoning and irreversible brain damage in the community, particularly in children. And how is brain injury mitigated? It begins in the education system.
It should be noted Flint is one of the poorest cities in America, with over half of its population identifying as Black or African American. And Flint’s schools predominantly serve Black and brown children. Unfortunately, due to years of underfunding, and the government’s refusal to pour money into Flint’s schools and its children in crisis, but instead freeze wages for faculty and staff, the children of Flint were left to fail. Instead of the government providing support to the children that it poisoned, it chose to blame the children for the behavioral problems the lead poisoning caused, and the government also refused to address the disabilities developed.
Fortunately, lawsuits and settlements have afforded the children of Flint access to medical care and improved education. But this is a national problem, a racial problem, and common across poor urban communities. An NRDC study from 2018 and 2019 found a strong correlation between race and inadequate and slow enforcement of Safe Drinking Water Act (SDWA) laws. Black communities have more violations, and more violations for more toxins and chemicals, of the SWDA than other communities. Overall, communities of color are less likely to have safe and affordable drinking water, more likely to be penalized for not being able to pay high water bills, and less likely to have violations of the SDWA corrected, than white communities. Orr said “if you’re white, if you’re wealthy, affluent, you’ll at least get your day in court.” Flint is not the only city where environmental justice is severely impacted by systematic racism.
Tara Houska, an attorney, member of the Anishinaabe tribe, and advocate for Native American environmental justice, joined the lecture from a pipeline resistance camp in northern Minnesota. The resistance camp was formed three years ago in hopes of stopping the company from destroying sacred tribal grounds with a pipeline. The pipeline is for a tar sands mining company. Indigenous and Black communities are the ones most greatly impacted by tar sand mines; the communities breathe in the toxic fumes from the tar sands, have cancer clusters, and deal with the violence associated with mining projects.
This camp is just one of the many camps and resistance movements established by indigenous peoples throughout the world. Houska shared the heart-breaking, real life problems facing tribal communities today. She called what is happening a “cultural genocide” and the “pursuit of comfort at the cost of others is not an effort that is being received well by our mother [Earth].” Indigenous peoples were forced on to reservations decades ago, and now industries are coming for the only land they have left. Indigenous communities are often forgotten, and yet they are relentlessly fighting for everyone’s right to clean air, water, and soil.
Barrett Holmes Pitner, Founder and Philosopher-in-Chief of the Sustainable Culture Lab, is the world expert on the concept on ethnocide. Before this lecture I had never heard the term ethnocide. “Ethnocide is the destruction of culture while keeping the people.” An example given was removing indigenous peoples from their land; the Indigenous people were stripped of their culture and yet they were still physical present. Another example presented was the transatlantic slave trade and the systematic destruction of African culture. Pitner claimed ethnocide is a “foundational component of American existence.” Ethnocide naturally led to systematic oppression.
Pitner detailed the definition of culture. Culture stems from a connection, or attachment, to a place. The clothes one wears, mannerisms, languages, all are essentially chosen based on place. In America, the idea of an attachment to place is being stripped from people, especially communities of color and indigenous communities. Black people are living in areas, like Flint, where it is okay to have polluted water; indigenous people are having their land stripped from them by big oil companies; overall, these places are viewed as disposable. Ethnocide can be used to draw in focus to culture, establish a sense of place, and advocate for the need of a clean environment for all.
Governments, industries, and corporations have created this hierarchy to dictate who is worthy of receiving clean water, what areas are worthy of being preserved, and what can be sacrificed in the short term to guarantee immediate comfort. Communities of colors and indigenous communities are at the bottom of the hierarchy. And this can no longer do (nor should it have ever been acceptable).
Tara Houska best summed up this lecture when she said racial justice is environmental justice. Systematic racism must be tackled to stop climate change and achieve environmental justice.