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Citizen Activism for Environmental Health: The Growth of a Powerful New Grassroots Health Movement

Center For Health, Environment and Justice

The year 2003 marks the twenty-fifth anniversary of the Love Canal crisis, when more than 900 working-class families were relocated away from a leaking toxic waste dump and the nation awoke to the hazards of toxic chemicals in our environment. This grassroots effort demonstrated how ordinary citizens obtained power through community organizing and succeeded against great odds. The events at Love Canal sparked a new social justice movement. While traditional environmentalism has focused on protecting the natural environment using legislative and regulatory strategies, the grassroots leadership of this new movement focuses on protecting public health through building power at the local and state levels to influence federal policies. Many members of this movement believe their neighborhoods were deliberately targeted because of their economic and political weakness. As a result, this is a movement that is as much about justice and human rights as it is about public health and the environment.

The ANNALS of the American Academy of Political and Social Science, Vol. 584, No. 1, 97-109 (2002)
DOI: 10.1177/000271620258400107


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