Page 12
CAREERS Special Edition
August 14, 2019
O PINION
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Climate Change Is a
Poor People’s Issue
Best reason to
support a ‘Green
New Deal’
m allika k hanna
If you’ve read any-
thing about climate
change over the past
year, you’ve probably
heard about the IPCC
report that gives a 12-year dead-
line for limiting climate change ca-
tastrophe. But for many parts of the
world, climate change already is a
catastrophe.
Recently in Bihar, one of the
poorest states in India, more than
40 people were killed by a severe
heat wave in just one day. A study
by UNICEF suggests that “in the
next decade, 175 million children
will be hit by climate-related di-
sasters in South Asia and Africa
alone.” Closer to home, Miami’s
steady sinking is depleting useable
drinking water at an alarming rate.
The truth is vulnerable commu-
nities have been dealing with the ef-
fects of climate change and environ-
mental pollution for decades now.
by
The 85-mile stretch between
Baton Rouge and New Orleans
— aptly nicknamed Cancer Al-
ley — is a stark example. Thanks
to petrochemical pollution
there, Louisiana at one point
suffered the second-highest
death rate from cancer in the
United States, with some lo-
calities near chemical plants
getting cancer from air pollu-
tion at 700 times the national
average.
This is no accident: Corporations
deliberately target places like Can-
cer Alley because they’re home to
socially and economically disad-
vantaged people whom the corpora-
tions assume can’t fight back.
There’s even a name for it:
“least resistant personality pro-
files.” Sociologist Arlie Hoch-
schild discovered this term in a
1984 study done by a consulting
firm to determine where a waste
board could build a plant without
local communities complaining.
According to the study, the peo-
ple least likely to protest having
their health put at risk were typi-
cally “longtime residents of small
towns in the South or Midwest,
high school educated only, Cath-
olic, uninvolved in social issues,
and without a history of activ-
ism, involved in mining, farming,
ranching, conservative, Republi-
can, advocates of the free market.”
While this study only tells part
of the story, it does a lot to explain
why poor communities face the
worst consequences of climate
change and pollution. These in-
equities cut across racial lines: As
Hochschild’s study shows, “least
resistant personalities” include
small town, working-class white
communities in the South and
Midwest, as well as poor black
people in places like Cancer Alley.
The problem isn’t just corpora-
tions, but government at all levels.
After Hurricane Maria hit Puer-
to Rico in 2017, the federal gov-
ernment did next to nothing. The
comparison between the respons-
es to 9/11 and Hurricane Maria
— whose death tolls were almost
exactly the same — highlights
just how overlooked the suffering
caused to marginalized communi-
ties by climate change is.
The idea that environmentalism
is an “elite” concern is a lie. Those
who stand to gain the most from
sweeping environmental protec-
tions are the marginalized people
corporations assume can be put in
toxic environments without fear
of backlash.
That’s the best reason yet
to support a Green New Deal,
which would not only curb cli-
mate change, but also revitalize
the U.S. economy, create millions
of jobs, and create alternatives to
harmful, unsustainable industries
like the petrochemical industry
in Cancer Alley that have harmed
people for years.
That could make poor commu-
nities a lot less poor — and a lot
more resilient.
The only way to move for-
ward is to fight back against cor-
porations that deliberately target
the people they think can’t fight
back — and against a government
seemingly unconcerned about the
effects of pollution and climate
change. The catastrophe is hap-
pening now, but so it the move-
ment to combat it.
Mallika Khanna is a freelance
writer from New Delhi and a
graduate student at Indiana Uni-
versity. This op-ed was distributed
by OtherWords.org.
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