4 Chapter 3: “Environmental Colonialism and Indigenous Environmental Justice Advocacy” by Taylor N. Johnson and Tarang Mishra

Introduction

One important context for understanding environmental justice in the United States is settler colonialism and decolonization. Patrick Wolfe defines settler colonialism as a system in which settlers arrive in a place to which they are not Native and seek to replace the existing society in that place with one of their own (Wolfe, 2006). Decolonization is, as Eve Tuck and Wayne Yang define it, “the repatriation of Indigenous land and life” (Tuck & Yang, 2012, p. 21). Because settler colonialism is inherently concerned with removing Native^[1] people from land in order to make way for settlers to claim that land, Kyle Powhys Whyte (Potawatomi) has argued that colonialism itself is a form of environmental injustice (K. Whyte, 2018).

In this chapter, we will explore three dimensions of environmental justice: distributive, procedural, and recognition justice. Each of these dimensions takes a different approach to understanding how environmental justice can be achieved, and each has strengths and weaknesses as a framework for understanding the relationship between environmental justice and decolonization.

Distributive Justice

The first framework that can be used to understand environmental colonialism and decolonization is distributive (in)justice. On a broad level, distributive justice focuses on the unequal distribution of environmental benefits and harms that disproportionately hurts marginalized groups. This framework emphasizes the importance of ensuring all people have access to a safe and healthy environment in which they can live, work, and play.

For Indigenous people in North America, distributive environmental injustice often comes in the form of disproportionate exposure to toxic environmental hazards and a lack of access to adequate resources. For example, access to clean drinking water is essential for healthy living, but Indigenous people are far more likely than most in the U.S. to struggle with that access. In 1908, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled that all Native American reservations have a right to sufficient water resources to sustain daily life and agriculture (Winters v. United States, 1908). Nevertheless, over a century later, Native American households are nineteen times more likely to lack access to indoor plumbing than white households in the United States (Sellers, 2019). This lack of access contributes to significant health disparities. For example, in 2020, at the beginning of the Covid-19 pandemic, members of the Navajo Nation, where one in three homes do not have access to piped water, experienced significantly higher rates of infection and death, as families had little choice but to travel miles to haul water in for drinking, cleaning, and hand-washing while individuals living outside of the reservation were able to shelter in place and exercise social distancing (Craig, 2022).

Another example of distributive environmental injustice for Indigenous people is nuclear colonialism. Danielle Endres defines nuclear colonialism as “a system of domination through which governments and corporations disproportionately target and devastate Indigenous peoples and their lands to maintain the nuclear production process” (Endres, 2009, p. 39). Although Native American reservations make up only about 2.3% of the United States by area, nearly 75% of uranium mines in the U.S. are located within 50 miles of a reservation (Regan & Anderson, n.d.; Swift Bird et al., 2020). This contributes to increased risk of liver, kidney, and heart problems as well as cancer in Indigenous communities located near these mines (Swift Bird et al., 2020).

Procedural Justice

Another important factor when it comes to environmental justice for Indigenous communities is procedural justice. This framework focuses on the structures that govern environmental decision-making procedures and emphasizes the importance of participatory inclusion for marginalized communities (Walker, 2009). Procedural justice emphasizes the importance of ensuring the communities who are most affected by decisions have a seat at the table when decisions are being made.

For Indigenous people in the United States, an important element of procedural justice is the consultation process that is required by the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA) of 1969 (NEPA, 1969). This act requires that the government assess the likely environmental justice implications of decisions prior to finalizing those decisions. However, although NEPA requires assessment of environmental justice as part of the decision-making process, it does not require agencies to consult with Native American tribes^[2] during that evaluation. Requirements for consultation became clearer in 2000, when President Bill Clinton signed Executive Order 13175. This order requires federal Agencies to engage in “regular and meaningful consultation and collaboration” with tribal governments regarding any federal action that might affect tribal governments in any way” (U.S. President, 2000). The goal of this order was to ensure that federal policies likely to affect Indigenous communities would be developed alongside tribal governments and account for the input of Indigenous people.

Unfortunately, the order does not establish a standard for what constitutes “meaningful consultation and collaboration,” instead leaving the logistics of implementing the requirement up to individual government agencies. This has sometimes resulted in consultation processes where Indigenous opinions are solicited but then ignored – what Judith Hendry calls the “decide, announce, defend” model (Hendry, 2004). One example of this is the decision-making process around the construction of the Dakota Access Pipeline near the Standing Rock reservation in North Dakota. The company that owns the pipeline applied for a permit to construct a section of pipeline under the Missouri river just outside the Standing Rock Reservation, which many residents of the reservation feared would jeopardize the reservation’s only source of drinking water and would have other negative environmental effects. During the assessment phase of the permitting process, hundreds of comments were sent to the US Army Corps of Engineers (the agency responsible for granting the permit) calling for the project to be rejected. Nevertheless, the Corps of Engineers granted the permit and construction began. In 2016, a group of Indigenous “water protectors” came together to oppose the pipeline, and set up an encampment to block the project’s construction. For months, thousands of people came to North Dakota to stand in solidarity with the water protectors and block the pipeline’s construction. The federal government eventually determined that the pipeline could be built and the encampment dispersed, but legal battles over the pipeline have continued, and are still ongoing in 2024 (Hu, 2024). This example demonstrates the importance of constructing environmental decision-making practices that not only include Indigenous voices, but actually center and listen to them (Johnson, 2019).

 

 

Recognition Justice

The third framework that can be utilized to understand environmental justice and the integration of Indigenous values into policies is recognition justice. This framework requires that “policies and programs meet the standard of fairly considering and representing the cultures, values, and situations of all affected parties” (Whyte, 2011, p. 200). It requires evaluating traditional processes of policy making and working to restructure them, helping to provide effective representation to Indigenous Nations within US environmental policy.

For Indigenous people within the United States, one important example of recognition justice is the federal designation of the Bears Ears National Monument by President Obama in 2016, allowing for the protection of a vital cultural landscape in the southeastern area of Utah (Kimmerer, 2016). The Bears Ears Inter-tribal Coalition (BEITC), a group of five tribes to whom Bears Ears is a sacred place, worked together to design a co-management plan that would share decision-making authority over the monument between the five tribes and federal agencies. This co-management plan centered Indigenous knowledge and practices as important guideposts for caring for Bears Ears. Proponents of the co-management plan argued that this model would combine science and traditional ecological knowledge (TEK), promoting Indigenous modes of environmental conservation. TEK is defined as “centuries of experience, tradition, and oral history passed down from generation to generation,” that provides critical insight from Indigenous people to inform how to manage the monument with respect and care (Grand Canyon Trust, 2021).

Although the recognition of this sacred site was a pivotal moment in history, the BEITC is still working to protect their jurisdiction of this site from settler encroachment. In 2017, President Trump signed Executive order 13792, instructing Interior Secretary Ryan Zinke to recommend changes to Bears Ears National Monument, leading to signed proclamations that significantly reduced the size of the Bears Ears National Monument (Lipton & Friedman, 2018). After these proclamations, tribes sued Trump to restore these protections, stating that he did not have the authority to dismantle these national monuments. However, while waiting for the district court’s decision, the Trump presidency ended, allowing President Joe Biden to issue an Executive order that initiated a review of Trump’s rollbacks. These reviews led to a proclamation that restored Bears Ears back to its full capacity, with 11,200 acres added since 2017 (NRDC, 2024). The extended disputes over the designation and management of Bears Ears highlight the importance of the recognition element of environmental justice. Because the monument is a sacred place for several Indigenous nations, protecting Bears Ears involves more than just management under the National Parks Service. For the BEITC, Indigenous knowledge of Bears Ears must be part of every decision in order to ensure the overall wellbeing of this place.

Reflection and Further Readings

Central to Indigenous movements for environmental justice is a sense of relationality between people and land. Indigenous environmental justice movements typically center care for land as a responsibility that all people have as members of a broader ecological community, and they emphasize that Indigenous nations have acted as stewards for their ancestral homelands for millenia. Thus, it is important for all people, both Native and settler, to reflect on our relationships to the places we live and how we can better care for the ecological communities around us and support Indigenous sovereignty. We offer the following reflection questions to help you begin considering these topics:

Whose homeland do you live in right now? One helpful resource for answering this question is Native-land.ca.

Where are your ancestors from? How did they get to the place where you were born? How did you end up where you are now?

What ecological knowledge or practices are important to the people whose territory you live in? Consider attending Indigenous-led events open to the public and/or finding the website of the tribe(s) who are local to you.

How can you be a better steward of the place where you live?

What are some movements that have happened within the territory that you are currently living in?

What are some ways you can further educate yourself on the importance of land conservation and Indigenous ecological knowledge?

In this chapter, we have discussed only a small sample of Indigenous movements for environmental justice, and have focused on defining and giving examples of the three primary frameworks that scholars use to understand environmental (in)justice in Indigenous contexts. If you are interested in learning more about this topic, we recommend starting with the following resources:

The Standing Rock Syllabus (NYC Stands with Standing Rock Collective, 2016)

Warrior Women (King & Castle, 2018)

Braiding Sweetgrass (Kimmerer, 2013)

ICA Pod (Indigenous Climate Action, n.d.)

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