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Environmental Injustice Concepts

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Digital collection of resources for understanding and using critical concepts to characterize and respond to environmental injustice. 

Main argument

Anonymous (not verified)
In response to
Lee argues that EJ practice has long stagnated over an inability to properly define the concept of disproportionate (environmental and public health) impacts, but that national conversations on system racism and the development of EJ mapping tools have improved his outlook on the potential for better application of the concept of disproportionate impact. Lee identifies mapping tools (e.g. CalEnviroScreen) as a pathway for empirically based and analytically rigorous articulation and analysis of disproportionate impacts that are linked to systemic racism. In describing the scope and nature of application of mapping tools, Baker highlights the concept of cumulative impacts (the concentration of multiple environmental, public health, and social stressors), the importance of public participation (e.g. Hoffman’s community science model), the role of redlining in creating disproportionate vulnerabilities, and the importance of integrating research into decision making processes. Baker ultimately argues that mapping tools offer a promising opportunity for integrating research into policy decision making as part of a second generation of EJ practice. Key areas that Lee identifies as important to the continued development of more effective EJ practice include: identifying good models for quantitative studies and analysis, assembling a spectrum of different integrative approaches (to fit different contexts), connecting EJ research to policy implications, and being attentive to historical contexts and processes that produce/reproduce structural inequities.

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harrison.leinweber
Annotation of
In response to

The article shows a number of responses historically that show competition among people or organizations who are conducting inquiries. The article provides a great deal of information and primary-source testimony that described the responses to various incidents. This testimony provided insight into how much people fought over who was to blame after disasters, and that people's rhetoric when discussing that has not changed greatly over time. This article supported its argument by including facts spread over the three other disasters mentioned.

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harrison.leinweber
Annotation of
In response to

This chapter focuses heavily on the a 1997 law in France that allows illegal immigrants to stay in France on a health basis and be granted amnesty as they receive health care. It discusses how this law evolved over several years to become what it is. The chapter also addresses humanitarianism and how it relates to treating and deporting illegal immigrants who are suffering from health problems.

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Anonymous (not verified)
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In response to

The article looks at the "chronic disaster syndrome" - consisting of a multitude of factors that all act upon a person or family after a disaser like Katrina. The aftermath of the distaster lasts years, and this can wear on one's health if they are unable to return to their normal lives. Being displaced for a long period of time, in less optimal conditions, in a new environment, with new schools and jobs, can be traumatic