Environmental Justice Law and Policy

Readings

For full details of the reading assignments listed below, see the Bibliography page.

Class Sessions	Readings
Part I: Introduction, Theories, and Histories of Environmental Justice
1. Several Founding Documents of Environmental Justice	Bullard, “Environmentalism and Social Justice,” pp. 1–20 Moore and Gauna, letter to Jay D. Hair Delegates to the First National People of Color Environmental Leadership Summit, “The Principles of Environmental Justice” Bassey et al., letter to George W. Bush Bullard et al.,“Toxic Wastes and Race at Twenty: 1987–2007,”  pp. x–14
2. Histories of the Environmental Justice Movement	Cole and Foster, “A History of the Environmental Justice Movement,” pp. 19–33 Pellow, Garbage Wars, pp. 1–99, 161–169 Pulido, Environmentalism and Economic Justice, pp. 1–56, 191 Suagee, “Turtle’s War Party”  Other Resources Taylor, “American Environmentalism” Sze and London, “Environmental Justice at the Crossroads”
3. Theories of Environmental Justice	LaDuke, All Our Relations, pp. 1–6 Coates, Between the World and Me, pp. 149–152 Kuehn, “A Taxonomy of Environmental Justice” Been, “What’s Fairness Got to Do with It?” pp. 1001–1009 (Introduction) and 1027–1068 (Part III) Harvey, Justice, Nature and the Geography of Difference, Chapter 8: pp. 176–204 Other Resources Auyero and Swistun, Flammable, pp. 1–20, 140–160 Lazarus, “Pursuing ‘Environmental Justice’” Pellow, “Environmental Inequality Formation”
4. Causation	Summers, “‘Dirty’ Industries” Rabin, “Expulsive Zoning,” pp. 101–121 Mohai and Saha, “Which Came First, People or Pollution?” Pulido, “A Critical Review of the Methodology of Environmental Racism Research” Other Resources Been and Gupta, “Coming to the Nuisance or Going to the Barrios?” pp. 3–32 Environmental Impact Assessment National Environmental Policy Act Council on Environmental Quality Regulations Council on Environmental Quality, Environmental Justice Guidance, pp. 7–16 In the Matter of Louisiana Energy Services, L.P., Parts I.A and III. Standing Rock Sioux Tribe et al. v. U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, pp. 21–23, 47–54 Site Cleanup and Enforcement Comprehensive Environmental Response, Compensation, and Liability Act, § 9607 Freeland, “Environmental Justice and the Brownfields Revitalization Act of 2001”
Part II. Advancing Environmental Justice: Risk, Regulation, Knowledge Creation, Land Use, Litigation, and Mobilization
5. Policymaking: Risk Assessment, Cost-Benefit Analysis	Walker, “Everything Is a Human Being,” pp. 139–152 Pulido, “Flint, Environmental Racism, and Racial Capitalism”  Risk and Assessment Carnegie Commission, “Risk and the Environment,” pp. 76–78 Kuehn, “The Environmental Justice Implications of Quantitative Risk Assessment,” parts II (pp. 107–116) and III (116–129) Cost-Benefit Analysis Sunstein and Hahn, “A New Executive Order for Improving Federal Regulation?” pp. 1489–1516 Ackerman and Heinzerling, “Pricing the Priceless,” pp. 1553–1578 Other resources National Environmental Justice Advisory Council, “Ensuring Risk Reduction in Communities with Multiple Stressors” Tickner et al., “The Precautionary Principle in Action” Livermore and Revesz, “Rethinking Health-Based Environmental Standards,” pp. 1185–1190 (Introduction) and 1200–1227 (Part II) American Lung Association v. Environmental Protection Agency Whitman v. American Trucking Associations, Inc. Michigan et al. v. Environmental Protection Agency, pp. 1–17
6. Forms of Regulation: Standard-Setting, Markets, Disclosure	Standard-Setting Lazarus and Tai, “Integrating Environmental Justice into EPA Permitting Authority,” pp. 617–649 Market-Based Regulation Johnson, “Economics v. Equity,” pp. 111–124, 143–149 Disclosure Karkkainen, “Information as Environmental Regulation,” pp. 259–294 Other Resources Driesen, “The Ends and Means of Pollution Control,” pp. 64–96 Overdevest and Mayer, “Harnessing the Power of Information Through Community Monitoring,” pp. 1495–1506 (Part II) Memorandum from Gary S. Guzy U.S. Government Accountability Office, “Environmental Justice” Karkkainen, “Bottlenecks and Baselines” U.S. Environmental Protection Agency Office of General Counsel, “Plan EJ 2014” Environmental Justice Leadership Forum, Comment Letter on Clean Power Plan
7. Scales of Action: Federal, State, and Local Policies to Advance Environmental Justice	Federal Responses Federal Actions to Address Environmental Justice in Minority Populations and Low-Income Populations, Exec. Order No. 12,898 U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, “EJ 2020 Action Agenda” [skim] State Actions and Cooperative Federalism Foster, “Environmental Justice in an Era of Devolved Collaboration,” pp. 472–494 Tribal Environmental Regulation Ranco, “Models of Tribal Environmental Regulation”  Community-Based Strategies Loh and Sugerman-Brozan, “Environmental Justice Organizing for Environmental Health” Other Resources Targ, “The States’ Comprehensive Approach to Environmental Justice,” pp. 171–184 City of Boston Mayor’s Office of Resilience and Racial Equity, “Resilient Boston: An Equitable and Connected City” Commonwealth of Massachusetts Executive Office of Environmental Affairs, “Environmental Justice Policy” Rechtschaffen, “Competing Visions: EPA and the States Battle for the Future of Environmental Enforcement”  Utility Air Regulatory Group v. Environmental Protection Agency, et al., pp. 1–29 H.R. 2486, Equity and Inclusion Enforcement Act
8. The Production of Environmental Knowledge, Litigation, Mobilization	The Production of Environmental Knowledge Corburn, Street Science, pp. 47–77 Arcaya et al., “Community Change and Resident Needs: Designing a Participatory Action Research Study in Metropolitan Boston”  Mobilization Bullard and Johnson, “Environmental Justice” Other Resources Haraway, “Situated Knowledges” Appadurai, “The Right to Research”  Corburn, Street Science, pp. 25–46 Fischer, Citizens, Experts, and the Environment, pp. ix–28 Sze, Noxious New York, pp. 143–211 Morello-Frosch et al., “Citizens, Science, and Data Judo,” pp. 371–392 Bryant and Hockman, “A Brief Comparison of the Civil Rights Movement and the Environmental Justice Movement,”  pp. 23–26
9. Land Use Planning and Environmental Justice	Arnold, “Planning Milagros,” pp. 3–10, 89–123 Been,  “Compensated Siting Proposals,” pp. 787–796 Cole, “Empowerment as the Key to Environmental Protection,” pp. 661–683 Calpotura, “Why the Law?” Other Resources Anguelovski, Neighborhood as Refuge, pp. 195–219 Dowdell v. City of Apopka, pp. 1181–1188 Litigation South Camden Citizens in Action v. N.J. Dept. of Env. Prot., pp. 452, 481–495 Bean v. Southwestern Waste Management Corporation R.I.S.E. v. Kay Draft Revised Guidance for Investigating Title VI Administrative Complaints Challenging Permits, pp. 39,667–39,684 Comments on Draft Revised Guidance for Investigating Title VI Administrative Complaints Challenging Permits Complaint Under Title VI of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 [skim] Letter from Rafael DeLeon to Christopher Reardon (Angelita C. preliminary finding) Agreement Between Cal. Dep’t of Pesticide Regulation and U.S. EPA (Angelita C. settlement).
Part III. Selected Contemporary Environmental Justice Issues
10. Environmental Gentrification, Food Justice, Prisons	Chavez, “Wrath of Grapes Boycott Speech” Penniman, “Radical Farmers Use Fresh Food to Fight Racial Injustice and the New Jim Crow”  Hilmers et al. “Neighborhood Disparities in Access to Healthy Foods and Their Effects on Environmental Justice” Checker, “Wiped Out by the ‘Greenwave’” Braz and Gilmore, “Joining Forces” Other Resources Anguelovski et al., “Assessing Green Gentrification in Historically Disenfranchised Neighborhoods”
11. Hazard Mitigation and Inequality	Pastor et al., “In the Wake of the Storm,” Chapter 1 Anguelovski et al., “Equity Impacts of Urban Land Use Planning for Climate Adaptation”  Lee and Van Zandt, “Housing Tenure and Social Vulnerability to Disasters” Hino et al., “Managed Retreat as a Response to Natural Hazard Risk” Hersher and Benincasa, “How Federal Disaster Money Favors The Rich” Other Resources Cutter and Finch, “Temporal and Spatial Changes in Social Vulnerability to Natural Hazards”
12. Disaster Recovery and Inequality	Howell and Elliott,“Damages Done” Gotham, “Limitations, Legacies, and Lessons” Capps, “Why Are These Tiny Towns Getting So Much Hurricane Harvey Aid?” Other Resources Texas Low Income Housing Information Service v. Ben Carson and HUD Greater New Orleans Fair Housing Action Center et al. v. St. Bernard Parish et al.
13. Movement Building	Cole and Foster, “Processes of Struggle,” pp. 103–133 Buford, “Has the Moment for Environmental Justice Been Lost?” 116th Congress, 1st Session, H. Res. 109 Lim, “How the Green New Deal Can Deliver Land Justice”  Other resources: Pellow, Resisting Global Toxics, pp. 73–95 Anthony, “The Environmental Justice Movement” pp. 91–98 Schlosberg, “Reconceiving Environmental Justice”
14. Just Transition	International Climate Justice Network, “Bali Principles of Climate Justice”  Sze and Yeampierre, “Just Transition and Just Green Enough,” pp. 61–73 Loh and Shear, “Solidarity Economy and Community Development”  Boyce and Pastor, “Clearing the Air”  Parties to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change,“Adoption of the Paris Agreement”  Other Resources Cleveland National Forest Foundation v. San Diego Association of Governments, pp. 1–25 Massachusetts v. Environmental Protection Agency, pp. 1–6, 18–32 Loh and Eng, eds., “Environmental Justice and the Green Economy”