This document summarizes key concepts related to environmental justice. It defines environmental justice as "the fair treatment and meaningful involvement of all people regardless of race, color, national origin, or income with respect to the development, implementation, and enforcement of environmental laws, regulations, and policies." It notes that environmental justice stems from the intersection of civil rights and environmentalism and focuses on addressing the disproportionate environmental impacts experienced by marginalized communities. Factors like economic resources, social capital, and structural discrimination can influence exposure to environmental hazards as well as health outcomes.

1. Environmental
Justice

2. Environmental Health
Chapter 8

3. “...the fair treatment and meaningful involvement of
all people regardless of race, color, national origin, or
income with respect to the development,
implementation, and enforcement of environmental
laws, regulations, and policies.”

4. “The term has two distinct uses.
The first and more common usage describes a social movement
in the United States whose focus is on the fair distribution of
environmental benefits and burdens.
Second, it is an interdisciplinary body of social science literature
that includes (but is not limited to) theories of the environment,
theories of justice, environmental law and governance,
environmental policy and planning, development, sustainability,
and political ecology.”

5. Civil Rights + Environmentalism

6. Social Justice

7. Disproportionate Impacts

8. Environmental Discrimination

9. Environmental Racism

10. Economic Resources

11. Social Capital

12. FIGURE 8.1 Ecosocial Framework of Disproportionate Exposure to Environmental Hazards
and Stressors
Source: Morello-Frosch and Lopez, 2006. Reprinted with permission of Elsevier.
Sources
Emissions/
Contamination
Exposure
Internal
Dose
Health
Effect
Industrial Facility/
Transportation
Corridor
Chemicals
Emitted
Indoor/Outdoor
Pollution Levels
Chemical
Body Burden
Birth Outcome
Community-level Measures Individual-level Measures
Community-level
Built Environment
Land Use/Zoning
Traffic Density
Housing Quality
Social Environment
Civic Engagement
Poverty Concentration
Access to Services
Food Security
Regulatory Enforcement Activities
Neighborhood Quality
Individual-level
Social Support
Income
Poverty
Working Conditions
Educational Status
Marital Status
Diet/Nutritional Status
Psycho-social Stress
Health Behaviors
Response &
Resilience
Detoxification
Capacity
Structural Mechanisms of Discrimination
Political Disenfranchisement
Economic/Financial System
Legal System
Social Inequality
Government & Industrial Investment Patterns
Ability to
Recover
Co-Morbidity/
Mortality
Residential Segregation &
Uneven Regional Development

13. text size A A A
Sick From Fracking? Doctors, Patients Seek
Answers
by ROB STEIN
May 15, 2012
Kay Allen had just started work, and everything seemed quiet at the Cornerstone Care
community health clinic in Burgettstown, Pa. But things didn't stay quiet for long.
"All the girls, they were yelling at me in the back, 'You gotta come out here quick. You gotta
come out here quick,' " said Allen, 59, a nurse from Weirton, W.Va.
1 OF 10 i
Maggie Starbard/NPR Maggie Starbard/NPR

14. text size A A A
As Temps Rise, Cities Combat 'Heat Island' Effect
by RICHARD HARRIS
Correction Sept. 4, 2012
A previous Web version of this story, as does the audio, incorrectly said that Ebenezer Baptist Church leases out
space for a community garden. While the land is adjacent to Ebenezer, it is actually leased out by Wheat Street
Baptist Church.
September 4, 2012
Richard Harris/NPR
Brian Stone Jr., director of the Urban Climate Lab at Georgia Tech, says that pavement stores heat during the day and makes
cities hotter at night. Cities, he says, tend to be heating up at double the rate of the rest of the planet.

15. Nausicäa
of the Valley of the Wind
Directed by Hayao Miyazaki

16. Breasts, a natural
and unnatural history
Florence Williams

17. The Story of Stuff
Annie Leonard

18. Your Brain on Nature
Eva Selhub and Alan Logan