How Accessible is the Environmental Movement?
The environmental movement is one effort that is desperately needed at this time of climate crisis. It calls on everyone, from individuals to companies to governments, to collectively advocate for and enact positive environmental change. However, despite the need for a unified movement, the environmental movement has proved to be somewhat exclusionary. Membership within this movement is largely limited to those with the financial resources and stability to participate, thereby barring the poorer populations from partaking. This is especially problematic since the impoverished and lower-income groups are among the primary victims of climate change.
I will first explore this idea within the context of Middlebury College. Middlebury is no stranger to environmental affairs, exhibiting an impressive level of environmental consciousness and action amidst the community. Though, it would be remiss not to acknowledge the concentration of wealth that surrounds the Middlebury environment both at the institutional level and at the student level.
Food is one area targeted within the environmental movement whereby participants can make decisions that will benefit and support the environment, such as eating local and organic. Locally sourced foods will often have a smaller carbon footprint on account of fewer transportation emissions. The college is fortunate to have the means to fund a food budget that includes buying local ingredients and products. In fact, according to Middlebury College Dining Services, the college spends 32% of its dining budget annually on locally sourced foods [1]. Additionally, the town of Middlebury has a co-op. The Co-op sources local and organic foods. Organic farming uses less energy and offers a natural environment for crops to grow free of any chemical pesticides that pollute groundwater. Despite its steep prices for these local and organic products, the Middlebury Co-op has proven to be wildly popular among students.
Through this lens of food, we can begin to uncover some of the financial barriers that are often disregarded or unnoticed within the environmental movement. As an institution, Middlebury College has the money to engage in behaviors encouraged by the environmental movement, like eating local. Moreover, a large section of the student population has the resources to go to places like the Co-op without thinking twice. However, that is not to say that everyone who goes to the college can realistically afford to spend a third of their grocery budget at home on locally sourced foods. Nor does that mean that all Middlebury students can afford to frequent the Co-op.
Instead, it reveals barriers. The college has actually been able to lower some of these barriers for students in providing local ingredients in the dining halls. Although, that would ultimately not be possible without the money requested of the students for their meal plans. So regardless of how inhibiting they are, these barriers often remain unseen. In the light, we are surrounded by those who pledge their allegiance to the Co-op. Whether or not they shop at places like the Co-op for environmental reasons is one thing. The fact of the matter is that there is a place that makes participating (whether it is your intention to or not) in environmentally conscious food selection accessible. But really, only to those with the funds to do so.
As we zoom out of Middlebury, it becomes evident that this trend is mirrored across the United States. Take a climate march, for example. Marches are common demonstrations organized by movements, and those that support the cause are encouraged to join. The pool of participants in a march will majorly be those who are financially secure because they can afford to take the time off work to join the march. Even if such a march happened on a weekend, where many are not in the office, that only really serves those who work one job. Who we won’t see at those marches are the people who work two jobs or those who cannot afford to take time off to participate in such an event.
For those people, that could be the difference between having enough money for their groceries, or if they can afford their kids’ textbooks, or perhaps even if they’re employed the next day. In this situation, it is not a matter of the amount of money being spent, but rather, it is about what is not being earned. While that distinction might not be significant for a lot of people in the movement, it can be all the difference for those on a low income. They might want to support the movement, but that particular way is not accessible to them.
Similar to the Co-op, in the example of a climate march, there is something (the march) that exists for environmental reasons. Many of the people participating are able to do so since they are not in a place of financial concern where taking that time away from other commitments is financially threatening. So, we see yet another example of people participating in this environmental movement because they have the funds to do so.
Those barriers create divisions within the environmental movement between those who can and cannot afford to partake. Through his idea of “slow violence,” Professor Rob Nixon identifies why these barriers are so problematic. In essence, slow violence is when certain groups or individuals are subjected to a system of violence that occurs out of sight and over long periods of time. The ways in which economic disparities have grown over time and kept the poor as a struggling and marginalized group is one instance of slow violence. This type of violence silences those groups and renders them invisible to the naked eye. Furthermore, the systems built on slow violence work so that those people are structurally and continuously kept in the dark. These systems are inherently unequal and plague the disadvantaged.
In the case of the climate crisis, the poor are disproportionately experiencing the effects of climate change. Poorer communities are among the areas of greatest pollution since they are often home to industrial facilities with unsafe, and sometimes toxic, practices. Unfortunately, the people in those communities cannot afford to move elsewhere and have no political power to advocate for their situation, so they find themselves trapped in a dangerously polluted town. Although they are experiencing climate issues first-hand, the poorer populations are often neglected because they are invisible to those operating under the system of slow violence. In this way, many remain unaware or turn a blind eye to their suffering. Then, when the poor try to disrupt the system by fighting against their injustices, like the environmental movement aims to do, they are met with barriers to participation. Those barriers perpetuate the system of slow violence because they keep the poor out of the movement and thus remain invisible.
When we neglect those groups of people, we build an exclusionary movement where certain people lose motivation to participate because there are too many barriers. In this case, we lose those voices that are so key to advancing the movement in a just and equitable manner. We don’t want that.
We should want a collective movement that not only includes but puts those marginalized groups at its forefront. All disproportionately affected groups must be totally visible and no longer displaced. We should be working to break down that system of slow violence by shining a light on these issues and raising up those voices. This is why we’ve seen POCs speaking at rallies or indigenous leaders intentionally placed at the front of a protest. The environmental movement should be seeking such ways to bring visibility to lower income groups and remedy the issues of accessibility that they experience within the movement.
There needs to be complete transparency if the environmental movement wants to truly reveal the injustices that are riddled because of the climate crisis and that have made it difficult for disadvantaged groups to participate. We shouldn’t have to look for them because they should already be engaged at the front of the movement.
One consideration can take place at the policy level. As the environmental movement pushes for green policies, it needs to consider the assumptions made about those affected and establish additional systems to support those who are unnoticed. For instance, plastic bag bans have been cropping up across the country where customers are charged an extra nickel or dime to pay for a plastic bag at the store. This assumes that everyone will be able to either pay the fee or purchase a reusable bag. But what about those for whom that would be a hardship? Should they be fined because their only feasible option is a plastic bag? Or are they to walk out with no bags? In this case, there is a need for supporting systems that would either waive the fee or, better, provide a reusable bag for a qualifying individual.
Once we peek behind the curtain at these policies that are intended to facilitate pro-environmental behavior, we see how they are not fully accessible and how these issues often go unnoticed. And as we move beyond this example and scrutinize the movement itself, we must ask ourselves: will we acknowledge what is now visible? And if so, are we willing to act?
[1] “Local Food at Middlebury,” Middlebury College, accessed April 16, 2020, http://www.middlebury.edu/student-life/community-living/dining-services/local-foods.
