The Environmental Movement:
Changing The Climate Of Opinion
by Peter Montague
The environmental justice movement has produced many victories in its short
lifetime. But what does ‘victory’ mean?
There are three kinds of victories in this movement:
First, there are local victories in which citizens tackle some problem, vanquish
their adversaries, and thus improve or at least maintain the local environment:
a ‘low level’ radioactive waste dump is defeated, a community garden is created,
an oil refinery reduces its poisonous emissions. Local victories have other
benefits as well: they give people real experience making democracy work, they
create connections between strangers, and they can plant the idea that the
community should be planning ahead to take control of its own destiny.
After a series of local fights highlights a problem, government policy becomes
ripe for change. The USA’s ‘right to know’ law is an example. Congress did not
invent this law, but passed it only after a dozen locales across the country had
passed their own municipal or state-wide right-to-know laws. So local fights are
the basic engine for identifying problems, inventing solutions, and eventually
changing government policies. Local fights “trickle up” to higher levels of
government where they generate new policies. It has always been so.
The second kind of victory is the policy victory, when government changes its
normal way of doing business. Examples: the burning of hazardous waste by
ocean-going incinerator ships is banned, or Congress declares that workers have
a basic right to a safe, healthful workplace. Unfortunately, policy victories
are rarely permanent and usually must be defended again and again.
Sometimes policies change not because local ideas have “trickled up” but merely
because of a lobbying campaign (which I call “whispering in the king’s ear”). In
those cases, the resulting policies are fragile and likely to be short-lived,
because they can be reversed by someone whispering more loudly in the king’s ear
(for example, someone with more money). Thus policy victories, especially robust
policy victories with widespread support at the community level, are desirable
but even fairly robust policies are not the ultimate goal of advocacy; they are
just important steps toward the third kind of victory.
The third kind of victory—by far the most important—is changing the climate of
opinion. Today slavery is not only illegal, it is unthinkable. The “climate of
opinion” would not allow a serious proposal to bring back slavery. Likewise, the
“climate of opinion” would not allow a public debate over the proposal, “Women
should be prohibited from voting.” Once a “climate of opinion” victory has been
achieved, it is much more difficult to reverse than a policy victory. The
“climate of opinion” determines what kind of behavior is unthinkable. “Climate
of opinion” changes are so big that often we aren’t even aware of them.
What hindsight shows us
Now let’s examine the victories of the environmental justice movement. The
movement has had thousands of local victories and dozens of policy victories. A
few of these victories have been described in books. But what makes the
environmental justice movement truly important is the changes it has begun to
make in the “climate of opinion.” I can think of two really big ones, so far.
(1) The common definition of ‘environment’ used to be ‘wild places’ not
including the places where most humans live. As recently as 1968 the Sierra Club
voted decisively not to focus the Club’s attention on urban environments, where
the majority of U.S. citizens live. However, during the 1980s, the environmental
justice movement succeeded in redefining ‘environment’ from ‘wild places’ to
“wild places plus all the places where we live, work, play, and learn.” (Sierra
Club has slowly accepted this definition.) This is a sea change and it’s
unlikely that we will ever go back to the old way of seeing things. Now
‘environmental’ issues affect—and can appeal to—huge numbers of people.
(2) The second major “climate of opinion” change is reflected in its name:
environmental JUSTICE. This needs some explanation.
About 1970, the emerging legal/scientific environmental movement lobbied
successfully for new national laws intended to curb environmentally damaging
behavior, the Clean Air Act, Clean Water Act, etc.
These laws require scientific proof that harm is occurring to humans and/or to
the environment before regulatory action can begin. I call this the “prove harm”
system of environmental regulation. Initially corporate polluters complained
bitterly that the new system would put them out of business, but this was just
another “Brer Rabbit in the Briar Patch” story; in reality polluters love the
“prove harm” system.
With the benefit of 30 years of hindsight, we now know why the system can’t
protect the environment or humans. Some of these reasons are:
(A) The “prove harm” system of regulation requires that harm must occur before
action can be taken. This means that many millions of people had to become sick
(with childhood cancers, reproductive cancers [breast, prostate], chronic
fatigue syndrome, diabetes, asthma, etc.) before regulators paid attention. Thus
regulators were put in the futile and frustrating position of trying to close
the barn door long after the horse had left.
As a result, the entire planet is now contaminated with potent, long-lived
industrial poisons that were released (and, in most cases, are still being
released) on the assumption that they are ‘safe’ because no on has proven
otherwise. By the time scientific proof of harm accumulates it is too late to
prevent harm. Thus true prevention is generally not an option under the “prove
harm” system.
(B) Science often cannot define ‘harm’ clearly, much less prove that it has
occurred. Take the case of the toxic metal, lead. In 1975, 39 micrograms of lead
in a 10th of a liter of human blood was declared harmless (40 was the ‘action
level’). We now know that 39 can cause severe brain damage in children. As
science improved, 29 micrograms was declared harmless, then 14 micrograms, and
now 9. Today—after 30 years and tens of millions of brain-damaged children—many
scientists acknowledge that any amount of lead in your blood can damage your
central nervous system and reduce your IQ. However scientists hired by the lead
industry dispute these conclusions, pointing to uncertainties in the data, and
so the scientific debate continues while the ‘safe’ level of lead remains at 9
micrograms, which most knowledgeable scientists consider damaging to children.
(C) As in the case of lead, there is always some uncertainty in any scientific
conclusion. Under the “prove harm” system, scientific uncertainty provides a
green light for business as usual.
Scientists will always be found who will cast doubt on any study, thus creating
scientific uncertainty so their employers can proceed with business as usual.
Some members of the world’s oldest profession (male and female) now wear white
lab coats.
(D) The “prove harm” system focuses on the “most exposed individual” and sets
regulations intended to protect that hypothetical person. If ‘risk assessment’
concludes that the “most exposed individual” will probably not be harmed by the
industrial discharge of chemical X, Y, or Z, that discharge is approved. What
the system fails to take into account is the cumulative effects of thousands
upon thousands of ‘safe’ discharges, which add up to contaminated neighborhoods
and a contaminated planet. By focusing on individuals and by requiring science
to “prove harm,” the system has sacrificed ecosystems and communities.
(E) The “prove harm” system bases its determinations only upon science, thus
omitting essential human values. For example, many people want to protect the
environment simply because it is God’s creation. The “prove harm” system
provides no place for such unscientific ideas to be expressed or acted upon.
Many women want their breast milk free of industrial poisons just because their
maternal instinct tells them that their babies will be better off. Until science
can “prove” that they are right or wrong, their instincts have no place in the
scientific debate over industrial discharges. (Indeed, such women are likely to
be told that they should go home and leave these matters to experts.)
Now the environmental justice movement is forcing a change in the climate of
opinion, making the “prove harm” system unthinkable. Having confronted this
system in thousands of local fights, grass-roots activists have now invented a
new approach based on real prevention. Call it “precautionary action.” Under the
new system, scientific uncertainty creates a yellow light or even a red light:
if you don’t know what you’re doing, don’t do it. Better safe than sorry.
Under precautionary action the government must prevent harm whenever there is
credible evidence that harm is occurring or is likely to occur, even when the
exact nature and magnitude of the harm is not proven.
Under precautionary action, manufacturers must show that they are using the
least harmful alternative to meet a specific need. Here, the potential for harm
is thoroughly studied before a new chemical or technology is used, instead of
assuming it is harmless until proven otherwise. In addition to using all the
available scientific data, precautionary decision-making will also respect and
use other kinds of knowledge: ethics, morals, humility, the human sense of
what’s right and good and just. This major change in the “climate of opinion” is
well along. Thanks to the environmental justice movement, “prove harm” is
becoming unthinkable and is slowly being replaced by “precautionary action.”
This is big. REALLY big.
Peter Montague writes for the Environmental Research Foundation. He can be
contacted at: P.O. Box 5036, Annapolis, MD 21403, USA. Fax (410) 263-8944;
E-mail: erf at rachel.org
References are available from New Renaissance.
This article was printed in New Renaissance, Vol. 11, No. 3
Posted on the web on May 15, 2006 |
